Rail passengers to benefit from new direct services to more destinations from Staffordshire and Cheshire this May

Rail passengers across North Staffordshire and Cheshire will benefit from quicker journey times and new direct services more destinations from May

London Northwestern Railway is introducing a new timetable from 19 May. Changes being made include the more carriages on some London-bound services from Crewe, quicker journey times to/from the capital and new direct services to destinations across the rail network, including Birmingham Airport. The changes will benefit passengers travelling for both work and leisure – including those using rail services during evenings and weekends.

A new Monday to Saturday service will operate from Crewe, via Stoke-on-Trent, to Wolverhampton, Birmingham New Street, Birmingham Airport and London Euston. On Sundays this service will operate as far as Birmingham New Street for onward connections across the rail network.

On services between Crewe and London Euston, some trains will have eight carriages, rather than four. The improvement comes as services will begin operating directly between Crewe and Stafford – shortening journey times between Cheshire and the capital, via stations such as Stafford, Rugeley Trent Valley and Lichfield Trent Valley. There will also be later evening services on the route on weekdays, with a new 2153 departure from Crewe. On Sundays, journey times will also be reduced, with trains from Crewe no longer travelling via Northampton.

Passengers from Alsager, Kidsgrove, Stoke-on-Trent and Stone will also be able to connect with fast London-bound services at Stafford for travel to and from the capital.

Across South Staffordshire, there will also a number of improvements:

Electric trains will be introduced on the Chase line, following the £100m electrification of the route between Walsall and Rugeley Trent Valley. This will enable faster trains to operate, with more carriages and extra seats for passengers.From Walsall, there will be an hourly service to London Euston and a half hourly service to Birmingham Airport from Monday to Saturday.

More services will operate between Lichfield and Birmingham on the Cross City line, with four trains per hour serving the station throughout the week.

There will also be more trains calling at Penkridge on the line between Birmingham and Liverpool.

Richard Brooks, customer experience director for London Northwestern Railway, said: “The timetable improvements being introduced in May will bring a range of benefits to passengers, with more direct services to destinations across our network and improved capacity on some of our busiest services.

“However, this isn’t the whole story. We will also have a further timetable change in two years time, where passengers will see further benefits from the introduction of new trains onto the network, which when fully operational, will increase capacity by 25%.”

The new timetable will operate from Sunday 19 May. There will be changes to the time and formation of some services, so passengers are advised to check their train times and to plan ahead for the changes. The new timetable is now live on journey planning systems and can be found at www.londonnorthwesternrailway.co.uk

ENDS