Easter 2014: Rail passengers face travel chaos

Updated
Trains at London Victoria station
Trains at London Victoria station



Rail passengers across the UK face long delays, closures and rail replacement buses and major disruption over Easter, with some main London stations due to close altogether due to a huge programme of planned engineering work.

Between Good Friday on April 18 and Easter Monday on April 21 no First Capital Connect or Southern train company trains will call at London Bridge, leading to amended services and, in places, buses replacing trains.

From Good Friday to Easter Sunday, all Southeastern train company services to and from Charing Cross station in London will start and finish at Cannon Street. Source: PA

Also over the Good Friday to Easter Monday period engineering work between Paddington station in London and Ealing Broadway in west London will mean disruption to services run by First Great Western.

Work between Paddington and Langley in Buckinghamshire will also mean disruption to Heathrow Express services.

Another big London station - Kings Cross - will be affected by engineering work between Kings Cross and Finsbury Park in north London. This will mean disruption to services run by the East Coast, First Capital Connect, First Hull Trains and Grand Central train companies.

In Essex, engineering work is taking place in the Pitsea area with buses replacing trains run by the c2c company between Basildon, Stanford-le-Hope and Benfleet.

Buses replace trains between Colchester and Clacton-on-Sea/Walton-on-the-Naze in Essex between Good Friday and Easter Monday due to engineering work.

Easter will also see all lines through Southampton Central station closing, with buses replacing trains on a number of routes affected.

Over Easter Saturday and Easter Sunday, engineering work is taking place between Swindon and Bristol Parkway closing all lines. Some trains between Paddington and Swansea will not run and trains will be diverted between Swindon and Bristol Parkway via Bristol Temple Meads extending journey times by 45 minutes.

In the north, engineering work on Easter Saturday and Easter Sunday between Carlisle and Carstairs/Kirknewton will mean buses replacing trains on some routes and route diversions.

This affects the CrossCountry, First TransPennine Express (FTE), ScotRail and Virgin train company services.

CrossCountry and Virgin, as well as London Midland, will also be affected by engineering work on Easter Saturday and Easter Sunday between Stafford and Stoke-on-Trent, while at the same time Northern Rail passengers will have to put up with engineering work between Manchester Victoria and Stalybridge.

Easter Saturday and Easter Sunday will also see engineering work at Sheffield station with an amended timetable in operation on services run by CrossCountry, East Midlands Trains, FTE and Northern Rail.




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