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Train at Bath Station

Around 20 million passengers use the railway stations in our region each year. Together with our partners, we’re investing £400 million into the West of England rail network. As a result, 100,000 more people in the region will have access to train services and remove millions of car journeys in support of our 2030 net-zero carbon target.

What the Mayoral Combined Authority has done already

Sign reading

A new rail station

The first new rail station in Bristol for 96 years, the £5.8 million Portway Station opened in July 2023 and is now being used for over 1,000 journeys each week. In an ideal location close to the M5 motorway, the station has 792 parking spaces available and provides a convenient way to travel into Bristol city centre or connect with the wider rail network from Bristol Temple Meads

Three people in front of a train, holding a departures board

Infrastructure improvements

Infrastructure improvements have also enabled more frequent train services to be introduced with half-hourly services between Temple Meads and Avonmouth and Westbury, Bristol Temple Meads and Gloucester via Yate and hourly services for Severn Beach. This has boosted usage with up to 30% more passengers at stations on these lines.

There's lots of fantastic work
going on across our railways and
I'm back here today at Ashley
Down station to see the building
work going on and look here's
the new footbridge.

Ashley Down
is just one part of the West of
England Mayoral Combined
Authority’s multimillion pound
program of rail improvements.

And as well as new stations, my
investment means passengers are
enjoying more frequent journeys
between places like Bath Spa and
Bristol Parkway or Keynsham and
Oldfield Park, Yate to Bristol
Temple Meads, for example, and
many more.

And there's a long
way to go and certainly lots more work to
do.

But early work has also
started on seeing if we could
get new stations in places like
Saltford too.

We’re helping get
more people out of their cars
and onto trains, which is
absolutely vital in this time of
climate emergency.

What the Mayoral Combined Authority is working on

Train platform by some trees

Six new stations

Together with partners on the MetroWest rail programme, a further six new stations will be delivered in the next five years, including with the reopening of the Portishead and Henbury lines. This substantial investment in infrastructure will support hourly services on the Portishead and Henbury lines.

Wheelchair user operating a ticket machine

Improving access to existing stations

We’re also making existing stations more customer friendly, through the £1.1 million Access for All project. This will deliver new seating, shelters and improved wayfinding at a number of stations across the West of England. We are also developing options for improving access to stations which currently do not have step-free access, initially focussing on Lawrence Hill Station, with design work now underway.

Group in hi-vis

A new regional plan

Thanks to the tremendous progress to date, the original "10 year plan" which was the first long-term regional rail plan for the West of England, is in the process of being updated. The plan sets out how the Combined Authority aims to deliver further rail enhancements, build passenger numbers, increase freight carried by rail and support the West of England’s key growth locations for housing and jobs. The Combined Authority are leading on the work, in partnership with Network Rail and local councils.