Proposed railway electrification in Great Britain. In July 2012 the UK government announced £4.2 billion of new electrification schemes, all at 25 kV AC. These will be Northern Hub, Great Western Main Line, South Wales Main Line, Midland Main Line, Electric Spine, Crossrail, Gospel Oak to Barking Line and West Midlands suburban lines.
As part of the Northern Hub project, the following lines in North West England and Yorkshire are to be electrified:
Liverpool to Manchester Line: Manchester to Newton-le-Willows completed December 2013; to Liverpool, planned by December 2014 but actually February 2015.
Liverpool to Wigan Line, planned by December 2014 but actually March 2015.
Manchester to Preston (via Bolton) by December 2017 and Preston to Blackpool North: by February 2018 . - this will provide an electrified route from Blackpool to the West Coast Main Line at Preston and then on to Manchester diverging from the West Coast Main Line at Euxton Jct. Originally, Preston - Blackpool was to be done before Manchester - Preston, but Network Rail said Preston - Blackpool needs to have new signaling and the opportunity is also being taken to completely remodel Blackpool North and Kirkham & Wesham station. The scheme will thus follow with a new completion date of February 2018. As a spin-off, in December 2013 it was announced that the branch from Bolton to Wigan North Western would also be electrified by 2017. However, the enhancements delivery plan update of September 2016 moved the completion date with only GRIP 3 being completed by then.
The North TransPennine route, comprising the Huddersfield Line between Manchester Victoria and York via Huddersfield and Leeds: expected by 2022.As an extension of this the Hull to Selby Line was going to follow: Hull Trains' planned to electrify the line between Temple Hirst Junction on the East Coast Main Line south of Selby and Hull using private finance. This moved closer to reality on 20 March 2014 when Transport Secretary Patrick McLoughlin confirmed in the House of Commons that he had made £2.4m available to move the project to the next stage of development, GRIP Stage 3. This scheme was to have joined the already planned transpennine electrification (part of the Northern Hub project) at Selby. In November 2016 this project was shelved indefinitely.
Windermere Branch Line: In August 2013, the Department for Transport announced that the branch line between Oxenholme and Windermere is to be electrified by 2016. The Hendy review moved the completion of GRIP 3 to March 2017 with a yet to be determined date for completion of electrification.
Great Western Main Line and South Wales Main Line
The electrification of the GWML to Thingley Junction (near Chippenham) and the SWML via Bristol Parkway to Cardiff Central is the main priority, due for completion in December 2018. Electrification from Reading to Newbury will also follow the originally intended schedule for completion in 2018. Other initially planned associated electrification works have been delayed with no published completion date: these include the Thames Valley branch lines, the lines to Bristol Temple Meads (both via Bristol Parkway and Bath), the line from Cardiff Central to Swansea, and the line from Didcot to Oxford.
As a spin-off, the Valleys & Cardiff Local Routes will be electrified once the main route is complete.
Midland Main Line
Already electrified to Bedford. This is to be extended to Corby, Leicester, Nottingham, Derby and Sheffield. In November 2016 only the electrification to Kettering and Corby was confirmed as continuing with the DfT refusing to be drawn on dates for the remaining parts of the original scheme.
Electrification of the lines from the Port of Southampton to Nuneaton, and to the Midland Main Line via the East West Rail Link between Oxford and Bedford. This would involve electrifying the Coventry to Nuneaton, and Coventry to Leamington Line, part of the Chiltern Main Line, Cherwell Valley Line and Reading to Basingstoke Line; also converting part of the South Western Main Line between Basingstoke and Southampton Central from 750 V DC third rail to 25 kV AC overhead.
New cross-London main line due to open 2018.
Electrification announced July 2013. Major civil engineering with line closures started July 2016. Full in service date expected to be June 30, 2017.
West Midlands suburban lines
Extensions to the existing West Midlands suburban electrification:
Cross-City Line electrification to be extended from Barnt Green to Bromsgrove by 2017.
Chase Line electrification to be extended from Walsall to Rugeley Trent Valley by 2017.
Although this electrification scheme and associated works has come to mean Edinburgh -Glasgow via Falkirk High due to be complete by December 2016, the rolling programme will then follow with the route via Shotts. The scheme via Carstairs in association with the ECML electrification was completed in the early 1990s. With other infills in the central belt of Scotland there will soon be 4 different electrified routes between the two cities with assorted diversionary routes.
On 25 June 2015 the government announced that some of the electrification projects would be delayed or cut back because of rising costs. Electrification work was to be "paused" on the Trans-Pennine route between York and Manchester and on the Midland main line between Bedford and Sheffield. Electrification of the Great Western main line would go ahead but the status of the Reading-Newbury and Didcot-Oxford sections was unclear.
However, in September 2015, the electrification work was "un-paused", but with a delayed completion date. Since then there have been regular updates including one published in October 2016.
On 8 November 2016, Transport Minister Paul Maynard announced that several parts of the Great Western electrification project were being deferred 'until further notice': these include the line between Didcot and Oxford, Henley and Marlow branch lines, the routes to Bristol Temple Meads, and the line west of Cardiff.
