Network Rail and Transport for Wales Rail Services thank passengers following Craven Arms railway upgrade

Network Rail and Transport for Wales Rail Services thank passengers for their patience as normal weekend services resume between Newport and Shrewsbury following railway upgrade work.

A major phase of the project to improve the resilience and reliability of the railway between Newport and Shrewsbury was delivered on time this morning.

Once completed by the end of this year, the upgrade work will enable a more reliable and robust railway for passengers, as well as allow for more flexibility in times of train congestion.

Paul Armitage, project manager for Network Rail Wales and Borders, said: “We would like to thank passengers and our railway neighbours for their patience during the last four weekends, as we worked to deliver improvements in the Craven Arms area. 

“Once we fully complete the work later this year, the newly installed equipment will allow passengers to benefit from a more reliable railway between Newport and Shrewsbury.”

Colin Lea, commercial and customer experience director for Transport for Wales Rail Services said: “Our customers deserve the best and most reliable railway possible, so seeing investment from our partners in Network Rail is excellent news.

“The line from Newport to Shrewsbury is one of our key routes and we appreciate this work caused some short term disruption so we would like to thank our customers for bearing with us during this period.

“Every effort has been made to keep the disruption to a minimum and we can look forward to seeing the long term benefits soon.”

The recent work, delivered over four weekends from 29 September to 22 October, involved upgrading the old signalling system as well as replacing points - the movable sections of track – which will allow trains to move between the Heart of Wales line and the Newport to Shrewsbury line.

Engineers also completed track renewal work at Woofferton, Ludlow.

Engineers will continue to work on the railway until December 2018 but the remainder of the work will be delivered whilst trains are not running, so will not affect passenger services.