Month of track repair in Wirral 'Loop' set to begin



A MONTH of work to repair the track in Merseyrail's Wirral loopline begins on Good Friday.

The £3.4 million project is part of a five-year £20m scheme to replace the entire track on the curved sections beneath the city centre by the end of 2009.

The work starts on Good Friday, April 10 and continues until Tuesday May 26, during which time all services from Chester and the Wirral lines to Liverpool will terminate at James Street station.

A bus shuttle will run from James Street to Lime Street station only. But Northern Line and main line services are not affected by the work.

Network Rail say passengers in Chester and Wirral will benefit from the latest phase of track renewal on the Liverpool underground railway.

Simon Whitehorn, Network Rail's area manager Merseyside said: "The renewal of the track brings benefits for everyone. Passengers get a better quality ride, it causes less wear and tear on Merseyrail's fleet of trains and the new track needs less maintenance by us."

Bart Schmeink, Merseyrail's managing director, added: "This kind of major engineering project will inevitably cause some inconvenience to our passengers.

"I am sorry that Wirral line passengers will have to put up with this but the end result will be a better and more reliable railway so it's worth the short term pain for the long term gain."

Tony Garrett, from Wirral Transport Users Association said: "It's a great inconvenience to passengers and residents from Wirral, particularly mothers with prams, peoople with mobility problems having to climb the old iron stairs at James Street to get to a lift, particularly with luggage, baggage and bicycles.


THE GLOBE

this means i be getting off at jame street then!

oh for christ sake not again more lates in work, i can bet that the shuttle service won't run smoothly.

Since day one of the Loop Line opening, over 30yrs ago, the problems of rapid rail wear have bugged the system. The average lifespan of plain track is about 10ys. On the Loop - about 2yrs !!

The radius of the curves are too tight! They got that one wrong at the planning stage ! On its own this leads to rapid wheel flange wear and wear on the rail head. Added to this is the problem of severe corrosion of the rails and their fastenings. The single line bores were made with "weep holes" to let ground water in. Trouble being is that the ground water/water table is continuing to rise. Additional pumping has been installed on several occasions, but more and more water floods in !

This also affects the track circuiting (signals) leading to random faults/delays. After the derailment outside L.Cen a while back, a report was published. In this report, bad track maintenance was a factor. Pictures show the advanced corrosion of the rail fittings. Drainage ducts etc. awash with rubbish that was never cleaned up. The running rails and fittings are always wet. Leakage currents/electrolytic action adds to the mix.

PROPER maintenance costs money! Sharholders in private companies don't like ongoing megabucks being spent for no return.

Being of "a certain age", I remember when the Mersey Railway ran on the 4 rail system. The insulated centre "return/negative" rail meant NO (electrical) leakage. The 3 rail system uses the running rails as a negative return. Not all that great in wet conditions when working with DC.

It will be interesting to see what they do with £20 million. In another 2 or 3 years, some old git will be ranting on about the Loop being closed again for track renewal !!!

Rant suspended !

Why do they have to start it over the Easter weekend ffs - idiots!!!

There's bound to be "out of towners" wanting to cross the Mersey either way, what kind of image does it give them?? "Did you enjoy your weekend?" "Not really, had to get bus, then train, then bus to do a simple journey because some numbnut thought it a good idea to sort train tracks out".

EPIC FAIL!!

Basically the whole time ive been riding to liverpool ive been riding on broken track *basically thats what it is if there replacing everything* Inregards to JAMES Street station why not use the 2 stretch of track for 2 journeys 1 for people without bikes , prams etc etc and the other for prams and stuff i.e. The side with the lift use for prams and the side with the iron steps use for the buisness people an people who dont give a sh** about a lift etc... Well you know what i mean i'll leave it at that.......

Again?!

They closed it about two years ago to replace track and had months of problems and delays afterwards due to increased wear.

and they wonder why we like using cars

My uncle actually tested the track alignment on the loop line before it went into service in the early 70's, it was o.k then

Just use the spare rails from the tram system!