Published on: Tuesday, 27 November 2012
Last updated: Wednesday, 5 October 2016
Train services on the Greater Anglia mainline route between Norwich and London Liverpool Street will not be affected by any significant pre-planned engineering work at weekends in December (from and including Saturday 1 & Sunday 2 December), with Network Rail having completed the autumn programme of overhead line improvement work on the mainline route between Shenfield and Chelmsford.
With the completion of these important works, rail passengers using Greater Anglia mainline services between Norwich, Ipswich, Colchester and London Liverpool Street can plan Christmas shopping and leisure journeys in December without any significant planned alteration to timetables.
Ruud Haket, managing director, Greater Anglia said: “The completion of the recent programme of mainline route improvement works is excellent news for our customers planning journeys during the busy December and Christmas travel period. Our alliance with Network Rail is also helping to reduce the amount of weekend bus replacement services in 2013.”
As previously announced, Network Rail and Greater Anglia have together agreed to reduce the amount of planned disruptive engineering work and need for bus replacement services from December 2012, including this Christmas and at weekends in 2013. Under the new improvement works schedule for 2013, only two Saturdays on the mainline will include a bus replacement journey, and only seven Sundays are similarly affected. There are no significant bus replacements planned from the end of March until early October.
The decision is the result of an alliance between Network Rail and Greater Anglia to provide an improved train service and achieve a better balance between delivering infrastructure improvements whilst reducing disruption to passengers.
Dave Ward, Network Rail route managing director, Southeast, said: “The essential work we have completed will enable us to run a more reliable railway. There is still a huge amount of work to do to improve things further but we have found a much better balance, which will provide passengers with a better weekend train service.”