Media centre

Tuesday 14 Jun 2016

Work to boost rail capacity at Martins Heron set to begin

Region & Route:

| Southern: Wessex

| Southern

Network Rail will begin work to extend the platforms at Martins Heron station on Sunday (19 June), allowing longer trains to call at the station as part of the organisation’s Railway Upgrade Plan.

The work is just part of an £800m investment in the railway running into London Waterloo, the UK’s busiest railway station. It is the biggest package of improvements for passengers travelling to and from the central London hub for decades.

Catherine Oldham, project sponsor at Network Rail said: “Since 1996 the number of passenger journeys on routes into and out of London Waterloo has increased from 108 million to over 230 million making it one of the most intensively used sections of the railway network in Britain, so we’re really excited to be delivering more capacity and better journeys for passengers on this route.

“Between now and the end of October we’ll be extending the platforms at Martins Heron to accommodate longer trains. During this time there will be some disruption to weekend services and fewer parking spaces available in the car park so I’d like to remind all passengers to check before they travel while works are ongoing.”

Martins Heron is one of ten stations that will benefit from longer platforms, which will allow ten-car trains to operate, rather than just the current eight-car services.

The new, longer services will be introduced in 2018. Other upgrades include rebuilding the former Waterloo International Terminal to provide an additional five platforms, and the introduction of 150 brand new carriages in the region’s rail network.

ENDS