Rail Travel this Easter Bank Holiday
Passengers travelling between London Euston and Scotland and through the Midlands over the Easter bank holiday are being reminded that the best time to travel is either side of the long weekend.
Between Good Friday (7 April) and Easter Monday (10 April), Euston station will be shut to main line train services for the final phase of upgrades to track and signalling at Watford junction.
As this work needs the entire railway to be closed over the four-day long weekend, trains will start and finish at Milton Keynes instead.
For that reason Network Rail is advising that people should travel on Thursday 6 and Tuesday 11 April, before and after the railway through Watford is closed.
- Read more: Why is Euston station closed this Easter
Passengers needing to travel on the days in between will have longer journeys, fewer available seats, and will need to use rail replacement buses.
The knock-on impact of the current emergency closure of a railway viaduct over the River Thames in Oxford will also mean alternative rail routes will be extremely busy over Easter.
For that reason, Chiltern Railways has advised only essential travel on its services.
CrossCountry passengers heading for the south coast are being advised to change at Birmingham New Street for West Coast main line services to Milton Keynes, where they can transfer onto rail replacement shuttle bus services to Bedford for onward train travel into London St Pancras to make connections to their final destinations.
Long distance rail travellers are urged to visit its website for temporary timetables brought in for passengers during the unexpected disruption www.crosscountrytrains.co.uk/disruption.
Those with pre-booked tickets are being advised to recheck their journeys as soon as possible.
Passengers who have booked assisted travel are also being encouraged to contact their train operator to find out how their journey has changed as a result of the Oxford to Didcot railway closure.
Dave Penney, Network Rail passenger director for the North West and Central region, said: ‘We’re reminding people that the best time to travel on the West Coast main line and Chiltern main line this Easter is on Thursday 6 and Tuesday 11 April – before and after we must close parts of the railway to carry out multi-million pound improvement work.
‘This advice becomes even more pertinent with the urgent closure of a railway viaduct south of Oxford used by CrossCountry services, as the knock-on impact over the Easter weekend will make alternative routes very busy. Please check with your train operator directly if you think you could be impacted by that – especially if you have booked assisted travel.’
Passengers should plan ahead at www.nationalrail.co.uk or check with their train operator for the latest journey information.
People can also follow the progress of improvement work using the #EasterRailWorks hashtag on Twitter.