Engineering work is taking place in the Salford Crescent area as part of the Great North Rail Project, closing all lines every weekend until Sunday 1 July 2018. Please note that this includes bank holidays (Monday 7 and Monday 28 May).

Engineering work has been cancelled for the weekend of Saturday 19 and Sunday 20 May, trains on this date will run on normal timetables. You can check your journey for these dates via the National Rail Enquiries Journey Planner

To allow engineers to access the railway, the routes between Manchester and Wigan Wallgate (via Salford Crescent and Atherton) and Manchester and Preston (via Salford Crescent and Bolton) will be closed every weekend with trains replaced by road transport. Direct trains between Preston and Manchester will continue to operate via an alternative route.

Buses will run between:

• Manchester Piccadilly / Manchester Victoria and Wigan Wallgate via Bolton / Atherton
• Manchester Piccadilly / Manchester Victoria and Preston via Bolton

Network Rail are currently working to finalise full details at which time amended timetables will be made available. We are very sorry for the short notice changes to timetables on these routes.

Trains up to and including 13 May are now correct in the National Rail Enquiries Journey Planner i.e. where buses are showing on the routes between Manchester and Wigan Wallgate (via Salford Crescent and Atherton) and Manchester and Preston (via Salford Crescent and Bolton). Where trains are still showing on these routes at weekends, please check back nearer to the time of travel.

You can find the location of your bus replacement by checking station signs or by searching for your station on our station information pages

Bicycles:

Non folding bicycles are not allowed on rail replacement bus services at any time. Folding bicycles are allowed if fully folded. For more information, please see here.

Project Information:

Continuing every weekend for the foreseeable future, Network Rail engineers will be working to complete the upgrade of the 25-mile stretch of track between Manchester and Preston via Salford Crescent to support the introduction of better trains.

The project was due to complete back in December 2017, but old mine workings, running sand and varying layers of rock have significantly hampered the installation of hundreds of steel columns needed to carry the power cables for the introduction of electric trains. New engineering solutions have been required to resolve the problems which has included using steel cylinders and filling them with concrete to deal with poor ground conditions.