Posted 3rd December 2024 | No Comments
Ashington line to open this month after ‘challenges’ were overcome
The restored Northumberland Line between Newcastle upon Tyne and Ashington will welcome its first passengers for 60 years on 15 December.
The route is opening later in the year than had been hoped, and four stations are unfinished.
When passenger services were withdrawn in November 1964, Ashington was an intermediate station and trains continued to Newbiggin-by-the-Sea, but Ashington will now be the terminus for trains from Newcastle, which will also call at a new station at Seaton Delaval and the existing station at Manors.
Four more stations still under construction at Bedlington, Blyth Bebside, Northumberland Park and Newsham are set to open in 2025.
When the project to upgrade the freight line to Ashington was first proposed in 2020, the cost was put at £160 million, but the final price will be close to £300 million. The budget for a single road bridge at Newsham alone has almost trebled from £11 million to £30 million.
Northern has been recruiting staff to work the new route, where trains will run every half hour during the day, taking about 36 minutes to complete the 29km journey. The peak single fare will be £3.00, reduced to £2.60 off-peak.
Neil Blagburn is Northumberland Line programme delivery director at engineering consultants AECOM. He said: ‘This milestone has not come easily but we’re almost there thanks to the determination of the people working tirelessly on the programme – from the people on site who have tackled extremes of weather to the people who have pulled together all of the documentation that satisfies the many legal requirements to enable passenger services.
‘At Newsham, although it’s very close to completion, it is our biggest and most complex site and there have been a number of power, engineering and regulatory challenges.’