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Tens of millions of rail journeys might be disrupted over the subsequent seven weeks by the closure of a key rail hyperlink in Oxfordshire attributable to a wobbly bridge.
The primary line connecting the Midlands and northern England with the South Coast is closed at Nuneham Viaduct. The bridge throughout the River Thames just a few miles south of Oxford wants emergency repairs due to “quite a lot of motion within the construction”.
The road linking Oxford with Didcot and Studying additionally serves commuter passengers from the Cotswolds and Oxfordshire to London.
Engineers have spent the weekend inspecting the construction and, on Easter Monday morning, Community Rail introduced: “Disruption between Studying and Oxford is predicted till a minimum of the top of the day on Wednesday 31 Could.”
In a video made earlier, Nicky Hughes, communications director for Community Rail Western, stated: “We’re actually sorry for passengers and freight customers that we’ve needed to shut this important stretch of line between Didcot and Oxford.
“That’s as a result of the bridge that you could see behind me is beginning to transfer and it’s transferring now to the extent that we don’t contemplate it protected to run trains over.
“We’ve been monitoring this bridge for numerous months now and we’ve been taking measures to try to make the foundations of the bridge safer, however sadly, these measures don’t seem like working. And naturally, we’ve had some important rainfall within the final month as properly.
“Within the final weekend, we’ve seen quite a lot of motion of the construction.
“As a result of the construction will not be protected, we can not run passenger and freight trains over it. That’s why we’ve needed to shut it.”
When the closure first occurred, it put strain on the choice hyperlink from Oxford to London, which serves Marylebone station within the capital on a separate route by the Chilterns. Hundreds of passengers who had been planning to journey on GWR’s Oxford-Studying-London Paddington companies switched to the Marylebone route.
That is now more likely to proceed till June.
For CrossCountry passengers, Nationwide Rail stated: “Trains might be revised to run in two parts; between Bournemouth and Didcot Parkway and between Oxford and Manchester Piccadilly.
“Restricted substitute highway transport is in operation between Didcot Parkway and Oxford.
“Prospects travelling between Bournemouth/Studying and Banbury/Birmingham/Manchester are suggested to journey by way of London stations or Bristol stations. This is because of restricted availability of highway transport at Didcot Parkway.”
Journeys are more likely to be prolonged by many miles and a number of other hours.
Paul Clifton, transport correspondent for BBC South, tweeted: “Vastly disruptive for passengers on @CrossCountryUK and places rail freight in an insupportable state of affairs: extra lorries on A34.”
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