Closures at Derby station to facilitate £200m upgrade
NETWORK Rail has confirmed that Derby station will be subject to a 79-day partial closure next summer, to enable completion of a £200 million remodelling and resignalling project.
Commencing on July 22 2018, East Midlands Trains services to Nottingham, Crewe, Matlock and London will be significantly affected at certain stages of the upgrade, while CrossCountry services will divert around Derby with bus replacement services running from Derby to connecting stations. A full and detailed revised timetable will be published in the New Year.
The work is needed because while the station itself was modernised in 2013, the signalling system has not been improved since it was installed in 1969 and is nearing the end of its operational life.
The track layout has also become increasingly inefficient as passenger numbers and service frequency continue to rise, caused by conflicting movements at London Road Junction in the station’s’ southern throat (where routes to Burton and Birmingham converge with the Midland Main Line from Nottingham and London).
Services on these routes will be better segregated under the new track plan, and a new platform built to reduce journey times and improve the flow of traffic through the station.
Meanwhile, the resignalling element of the upgrade will enable NR to close Derby Power Signal Box and transfer all control to East Midlands Control Centre, which is also in Derby.
Network Rail’s London North Eastern and East Midlands Route Managing Director Rob McIntosh said: “It is many decades since the rail infrastructure at Derby had this kind of investment, and we have spent a huge amount of time working with our train operators, stakeholders and local businesses to make sure we keep disruption to a minimum while getting this vital work done as quickly as possible.
“Derby is a key interchange on the Midland Main Line. Once the upgrade is complete and the bottleneck removed, the region will benefit from a more efficient, reliable and modern network fit to meet the needs of the economies and communities our railway serves.”
East Midlands Trains Managing Director Jake Kelly said: “Our key priority is to ensure that we provide the best possible service for our customers during the works.
“We are developing comprehensive plans to ensure that we can continue running as many of our London train services as possible, while ensuring that we can offer reliable replacement rail services on the local routes during the times we are not able to operate our train services.”
CrossCountry Managing Director Andy Cooper added: “These works will mean a long period of disruption for many CrossCountry customers, which is something we’d always try to avoid.
“However, the journey time improvement they deliver will get our customers to the North East quicker than ever before. The railway layout at Derby was great in the ‘days of steam trains’, but it does not meet the needs of today’s much busier railway.” ■ A full feature on the upgrade will appear in RAIL 833.