£76m signal and track upgrade completed on time as Network Rail reopens railway between Banbury, Bicester and Leamington

Engineers have replaced the signalling through Banbury by upgrading it to a more reliable and modern system, which will help improve the punctuality and reliability of Chiltern train services between Birmingham and London, as well as local services for CrossCountry passengers.

The railway upgrade at Banbury included:

• 14,000 metres of new rail
• 50,000 tonnes of new ballast – (the stone which forms the foundation of the track)
• 24 new points – which allow trains to change from one track to another
• a new fourth platform at Banbury station, allowing for greater capacity and flexibility for station users.

"Our engineers worked quickly and safely to complete this work on time and on budget and we worked closely with the train operators involved to carefully plan these improvements to cause the least amount of disruption to passengers. I’d like to thank passengers for their patience while the improvements took place." Martin Ball, area director for Network Rail.

"The improvements to the Banbury infrastructure are a key investment to help us keep our trains some of the most reliable in the country. We have been working hard to provide our coordinated fast replacement bus services to make the closure as easy as possible for our customers." Dave Penney, managing director at Chiltern Railways.

About Network Rail

Network Rail owns, manages and develops Britain’s railway – the 20,000 miles of track, 40,000 bridges and viaducts, and the thousands of signals, level crossings and stations (the largest of which we also run). In partnership with train operators we help people take more than 1.6bn journeys by rail every year - double the number of 1996 - and move hundreds of millions of tonnes of freight, saving almost 8m lorry journeys. We’re investing £38bn in the railway by 2019 to deliver more frequent, more reliable, safer services and brighter and better stations.