Stadium station is finally ready for fans
COVENTRY City and Wasps fans will finally be able to use the Ricoh Arena train station on matchdays after a change in the firm operating the rail line.
Safety concerns have meant that, ever since the station opened in January 2016, supporters have not been able to use the £3.4 million platform after games.
That’s due to a lack of capacity on the current service which means it only has enough space for 75 people and stops at the station once an hour.
As a result, trains scheduled immediately after major events at the Ricoh Arena do not stop at the station.
But West Midlands Trains, which will take over from current operators London Midland in December, has pledged to triple capacity on Saturdays to allow the service to run after matches.
The new operators have also pledged to protect all other services to and from Coventry stations, with no reductions on weekdays or weekends.
There will also be a new hourly service between Leamington, Kenilworth Coventry and Nuneaton from December 2018.
A spokesman for West Midlands trains said: “The service will be tripled on Saturdays to cope with current Ricoh Arena capacity issues.
“For major events not on a Saturday the timetable won’t change, but we may be able to put on additional trains in agreement with Ricoh Arena.”
The spokesman addd: “The services to stations on the Coventry to Nuneaton line will be doubled in frequency on Mondays to Fridays, and also on Sundays.
“On the mainline Coventry service, there will be increased services on Sundays, and no fewer services than currently exist during the week.
“There is no reduction of any services anywhere, so weekend services will not be reduced elsewhere, including to/from London on weekdays/weekends. Our intention is to run a shuttle service hourly from Leamington to Coventry then Nuneaton. It will be introduced in December 2018.”
The station took a decade to get off the ground and was eventually built as part of £13.6 million NUCKLE rail line upgrades.
They were funded by taxpayers through £5m from Centro, £4.75m from the Department for Transport and £3.85m from the European Regional Development Fund.
Since it opened in January 2016, London Midland said it could not source extra trains or carriages to be able to increase capac- ity to/from the Ricoh Arena station on matchdays.
A trial using charter trains on matchdays was launched in partnership with Ricoh Arena landlords Wasps, but it proved costly with two trains estimated to have left the two organisation roughly £40,000 in the red.