Rail passengers travelling between Newcastle and Edinburgh are being urged to check their journey before travelling as three weekends of track and drainage work begin on the East Coast Main Line.
Network Rail Scotland said the line will be closed between Edinburgh and Berwick each Saturday and Sunday until Monday, 30 September, starting this weekend.
On Sunday 22 and 29 September, the Borders Railway will also be closed between Edinburgh and Gorebridge to allow work to take place in the Portobello area.
Engineers will install just over 5 miles of new railway track at several locations between Edinburgh and Berwick as part of a £9m investement. At the same time, engineers will improve over a mile of drainage at Drem.
When the work is complete, East Coast Main Line passengers will benefit from smoother and more reliable journeys, the network operator said.
To keep passengers on the move, a limited train service will divert around the closure with rail replacement coaches** also in operation between Edinburgh and Newcastle during the weekend work.
READ MORE:
- New rail link in Scotland would provide 'economic boom' in North East
- Punctuality for London-Scotland trains on East Coast reaches seven-year low
Ross Moran, route director, Network Rail Scotland said: “Renewing the track on the East Coast Main Line will improve reliability and performance on this busy cross-border route, delivering smoother journeys for passengers.
“We know there’s never a good time to close a railway and we’re grateful to passengers and our neighbours for their patience.
“Our engineers will work around the clock over these three weekends to complete these projects quickly, with as little disruption as possible.
A spokesperson on behalf of LNER, ScotRail, Lumo, CrossCountry and TransPennine Express said: “Our teams will be working hard to make sure customers reach their destination as quickly as possible while these important upgrades are carried out.“The latest travel information can be found on our websites and our social media channels. We would encourage all customers to check their journey before they travel.”
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereLast Updated:
Report this comment Cancel