Residents invited to find out more ahead of summer railway upgrade

Thursday 15 Jun 2017

Residents invited to find out more ahead of summer railway upgrade

Region & Route:: Wales & Western: Western; | Wales & Western

Residents living in Wiltshire and South Gloucestershire are invited to find out more about a crucial upgrade of the Great Western mainline.

Network Rail will host a series of drop in sessions ahead of a four week programme of work which will take place from Royal Wootton Bassett through to Bristol Parkway between Saturday 19 August and Friday 15 September.

The upgrade will also make way for the arrival of a fleet of new, longer Intercity Express Trains later this year, bringing more seats per train and adding greater comfort for passengers. These trains will run on electric from December 2018, once the electrification project is complete.

As part of the work, sections of the mainline will be closed to passengers with Bristol Parkway also closed between September 2 and 15. This will allow work to begin on a new platform at Bristol Parkway as well as extension of existing platforms, flood resilience measures installed at Chipping Sodbury and overhead line equipment installed on 25 miles of the route in readiness for electrification.

Over the four weeks, trains will still be running using diversionary routes. Rail replacement bus and coach services will be in place for some journeys.

Garry Fernand, Network Rail project manager, said: “The upgrade will transform this section of the railway as we deliver electrification as part of our Railway Upgrade Plan. It is a major programme of work and we would like to invite all residents living near the railway to one of our sessions where they can find out more.”

Drop in sessions will take place on the following dates

Thursday 22 June, Brinkworth Village Hall, 4pm to 6pm
Tuesday 27 June, Little Somerford Village Hall, 4.30pm to 7pm
Thursday 29 June, Coalpit Heath Village Hall, 4.30pm to 7pm
Tuesday 4 July, Ridgewood Community Centre, Yate, 4.30pm to 7pm
Tuesday 11 July, The Old School Rooms, St Michael’s Centre, Stoke Gifford, 4.30pm to 7pm
Wednesday 12 July, Chipping Sodbury Town Hall, 4.30pm to 7pm
Thursday 13 July, Trinity Primary School, Acton Turville, 6pm to 8pm
Tuesday 18 July, Old Sodbury Village Hall, 4.30pm to 7pm
Wednesday 19 July, Hullavington Village Hall, 5.30pm to 8pm

Passengers are advised to check before they travel throughout the upgrade by visiting gwr.com/bristolparkway2017 or crosscountrytrains.co.uk

Contact information

Passengers / community members
Network Rail national helpline
03457 11 41 41

Latest travel advice
Please visit National Rail Enquiries

Journalists
Network Rail press office - Dean Shaw
Media Relations Manager
07730 354394
dean.shaw@networkrail.co.uk

About Network Rail

We own, operate and develop Britain's railway infrastructure; that's 20,000 miles of track, 30,000 bridges, tunnels and viaducts and the thousands of signals, level crossings and stations. We run 20 of the UK's largest stations while all the others, over 2,500, are run by the country's train operating companies.

Usually, there are almost five million journeys made in the UK and over 600 freight trains run on the network. People depend on Britain's railway for their daily commute, to visit friends and loved ones and to get them home safe every day. Our role is to deliver a safe and reliable railway, so we carefully manage and deliver thousands of projects every year that form part of the multi-billion pound Railway Upgrade Plan, to grow and expand the nation's railway network to respond to the tremendous growth and demand the railway has experienced - a doubling of passenger journeys over the past 20 years.

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