Network Rail has spent £12.5m on renewing tracks, points, bridges and viaducts in Staffordshire over the last three weeks. It promises that rail journeys on the West Coast Main Line through Staffordshire will now be better.

Network Rail’s engineers carried out the work during August. Unusually, this required closing a fifty-mile stretch of the West Coast Main Line from Stone through Stoke-on-Trent to Stockport for twenty-one days.

The work was carried out between Saturday 2 and Friday 22 August, after Network Rail warned passengers of the closure in July. Train services on the line resumed on Saturday 23 August.

The closure allowed hundreds of workers from Network Rail and its supply chain to carry out the infrastructure upgrades, which included:

• refurbishing the River Trent Viaduct: improving its structure and waterproofing, installing new concrete slabs and upgrading the viaduct’s drainage
• renewing track at Stone station: replacing 22 track panels, refreshing 2,500 tonnes of ballast, and installing more than fifty new rails
• upgrading level crossings: enhancing Meaford, Church Lane, and Aston-by-Stone level crossings to make them safer and make their infrastructure more resilient
• improving Longport station footbridge: better staircases, concrete work and repainting
• improving 500m of track and drainage near Trentham
• upgrading 250m of track near Hixon.

Network Rail has released footage of the Staffordshire upgrade work. This video was filmed at Stone during the closure of the railway.

Over the recent August bank holiday, Network Rail also carried out improvements to the West Coast Main Line south. Just north of Leighton Buzzard station, its workers installed 300 metres of new drainage.

This section of railway has been prone to flooding during episodes of heavy rainfall. Network Rail aims for the new, improved drainage to reduce the risk of flooding and to keep trains moving during bad weather.

“We are pleased that the Potteries line has now returned to a normal timetable following a suite of important improvements. I would like to thank our passengers for their patience while Network Rail carried out these works.”

Jonny Wiseman, customer experience director at London Northwestern Railway