Scotland’s railway on track for £16m upgrade over Christmas

Image: Karl Weller (Shutterstock)

SCOTLAND’S railway is to benefit from more than £16 million of investment over Christmas and New Year, Network Rail has announced.

The investment will see the rail management firm’s engineers relay track, renew junctions and refurbish structures across the country – with work taking place in Glasgow, Edinburgh, Stirling, Perth and Inverness.

In Glasgow, a key line into Glasgow Queen Street High Level station will be affected from Christmas Day until January 2 while engineers renew points (rails which move to allow trains to cross from one track to another) and replace over 1km of track at Cadder.

On the south side of the River Clyde, engineers will work from New Year’s Day until the early hours of January 4 to renew junctions and life-expired track between Muirhouse and Eglinton Street, near Glasgow Central station.

In Stirlingshire, engineers will be delivering a range of works to renew track, upgrade signalling and level crossings while in Perth and Inverness works will be delivered to improve track at both stations.

Kris Kinnear, Network Rail Scotland’s capital delivery director, said, “The work we are undertaking over the festive period is vital to the long-term future of Scotland’s Railway and part of a £4 billion investment being made in Scotland’s rail infrastructure between now and 2024.

“These projects will help make our railway more resilient, more reliable and more sustainable, but such complex infrastructure improvements cannot be delivered without some short-term closures of the railway.

“We’re urging passengers who need to travel over the festive period to plan ahead and check how these works may affect their journey this December and early January.”