Customers based on South Western Railway’s West of England line will benefit from extra services and journey opportunities when the next train timetable is introduced, from 19 May.
Andy Mellors, Managing Director of South Western Railway, welcomed the good news:
“There will be substantial changes to our next timetable starting in May, which will bring over 300 additional train services a week for our customers across the network.
“Many of these service enhancements are based on extensive consultations and feedback sessions that were undertaken previously with local stakeholders, businesses, community groups and customers.
“We are very pleased that these enhancements will come to fruition shortly and we will continue to work on refurbishing our existing fleet and introducing brand new state-of-the-art trains in to service by the end of the year.”
Some of the highlights for the West of England lines are:
- Additional off-peak services extended to / from Yeovil Junction from Salisbury creating new Yeovil – Waterloo journey options
- The summer Saturday service to / from Weymouth via Yeovil returns and is extended to run from Waterloo
- Additional direct services between Castle Cary, Bruton, Frome, Westbury, Trowbridge, Warminster, Keynsham, Oldfield Park, Bath Spa, Bristol Temple Meads and Salisbury, Clapham Junction and Waterloo
- Bruton and Frome now have opportunities for day trips to London by direct services
- The new 19.35 return service from Bristol and Bath to Basingstoke offers opportunities for longer day or afternoon trips
- Additional calls at Clapham Junction on some Waterloo – Salisbury / Yeovil services improving connection options and spreading demand from Exeter services
- Additional calls at Oldfield Park to serve Bath University’s campus and Hayesfield Girls School
- Additional evening Waterloo – Salisbury (and return) services adding additional capacity and providing faster journey times between Waterloo, Andover and Salisbury.
- New Salisbury – Reading services on Sundays, opening up new journey opportunities and connections via Reading as well as significantly improving service frequencies for Salisbury and Andover
- 20 Waterloo – Axminster (Saturday) service extended to Honiton and 22.20 Waterloo to Salisbury (Monday to Friday) extends to Gillingham, both offering new journey options from London in the evenings
- Additional calls at Pinhoe, improving journey options and capacity for the new housing and employment in the area
- Stopping patterns at Whimple and Feniton altered to improve performance of services in the Exeter area
Full details of all timetable changes for May 2019 are available online at southwesternrailway.com or nationalrail.co.uk, or you can download the full list.
