Bottleneck at Bristol East is removed
Work paves the way to support future new suburban services as part of the West of England Combined Authority’s (WECA) MetroWest scheme.
RESHAPING of the eastern approaches to Bristol Temple Meads station, a project for which the first stages happened at Christmas 2020, was completed on September 3.
The track layout of Bristol East Junction dates from the 1960s, but with an increase in trains, congestion and delays for trains entering or leaving the station were worsening.
The main phase of this
£132m Department for Transport-funded project started on July 10, and over the past eight weeks Network Rail engineers have worked day and night using a total of 50 engineering trains to replace over 5km of track, install over 300 track panels and lay around 26,000 tonnes of ballast.
An old signalling gantry has been removed and a new gantry, installed over the Christmas period last year (2020), has been brought online.
As part of the project, an additional line has been laid which paves the way to support future new suburban services as part of the West of England Combined Authority’s (WECA) MetroWest scheme. Once complete, this scheme will provide over 4000 additional seats on trains every day in the area.
Some follow up work over the weekend of September 25/26 was carried out affecting trains to and from Bath.
Mike Gallop, Network Rail’s Western route director, said: “This was a highly complex piece of engineering that has taken several years to plan. The upgrade of Bristol East Junction is just one aspect of our wider Bristol Rail Regeneration programme that is transforming the station and railway in Bristol for the benefit of passengers, the city and West of England region.”