Latest News

Following the completion of the GRIP 4 design and business case work in July 2010, the East West Rail Consortium is progressing with some refinement of the railway infrastructure design to reflect current strategic thinking emerging from the Department for Transport. Primarily this involves assessing the impact of introducing a twin track railway from Oxford […]

The East West Rail Consortium has completed its latest stage of development work on the western section of the project. The business case and detailed engineering design work (known as GRIP 4) is now complete and has revealed an exceptionally strong case for the project. The GRIP 4 study has established a feasible design to […]

The East West Rail Consortium has recently completed its review of route options for the Central Section of the overall route, broadly the area between Milton Keynes and Cambridge. This work complements the progress that is being made on the Western Section (Oxford/Aylesbury – Bletchley – Milton Keynes – Bedford). Following examination of the how […]

The East West Rail Consortium welcomes the official launch of Chiltern Railway’s Evergreen 3 project by The Secretary of State for Transport, Lord Adonis on Friday 15 January. Evergreen 3 is set to deliver a new rail route from London to Oxford by connecting the Chiltern and East West routes at Bicester and upgrading the […]

The East West Rail Consortium is still developing a preferred option for reinstating a rail link between Bedford and Cambridge. A discussion paper was published in February identifying a number of alternative routes and invited comments from local and regional stakeholders, as well as the Department for Transport and Network Rail. A number of consultation […]

Outline design work continues apace on the western section of East West Rail with additional site investigation starting this month. The work will include excavating trial trenches along the route and making a number of boreholes to help engineers understand the condition of the ground before designing any necessary ground improvements. The site investigation is […]

The East West Rail Consortium, Milton Keynes Partnership and Chiltern Railways will be presenting their plans for developing the railway between Oxford, Bicester Town and Milton Keynes to the public this month at exhibitions in Bicester (17th April), Oxford (18th April) and Kidlington (25th April). With two major projects being developed at the same time, […]

The East West Rail Consortium has today published a discussion paper re-examining the route options for the East West Rail link between Bedford and Cambridge. With the East of England Regional Assembly and the Government Office for the East of England developing an implementation plan for the regional spatial strategy and regional economic strategy, the […]

Around 20 kilometres of disused railway line between Bletchley and Claydon Junction stations will be cleared of scrub, brambles and overgrown vegetation so that survey and investigation work can be carried out for the design development phase of the East West Rail project. Starting on 26 January, the clearance will take two to three weeks […]

Milton Keynes Partnership (MKP) and the East West Rail Consortium (EWRC) have commissioned work to complete the design for the western section of East West Rail. Known as Guidance on Railway Investment Projects (GRIP) 4, this project will include a fully developed operating and business case and will be completed by December 2009. Atkins Consultancy […]