Mines to be secured before 'game-changing' £54m work on new stations can get on track
Mine shafts beneath the future site of Willenhall Railway Station will need to be stabilised before above-ground work on the station can begin, railway chiefs have said.
The station is being built on waste ground off Bilston Street as part of a £54 million project which will also see a new station built at James Bridge, situated in Darlaston.
The original stations in both towns closed 56 years ago in the Beeching Cuts, and bosses say the opening of a new Willenhall station will enable passengers to travel to either Walsall or Wolverhampton in eight minutes and Birmingham New Street in 25 minutes.
Now chiefs behind the project, which started up last year, have said they need to make sure they "stabilise the ground before we can construct the station" due to the legacy of coal mining in the area.
To help prepare, passenger trains will soon run on tracks which currently only serve freight trains, Walsall North MP Eddie Hughes said.
West Midlands Mayor Andy Street last year called the project an "absolute game-changer" which would improve the area's connectivity with the rest of the West Midlands.
“People in Walsall have waited decades to see this station return, and with Darlaston to follow shortly afterwards as part of the re-opened Walsall to Wolverhampton line, this really is an absolute game-changer for the Black Country," he said.
The stations will see two trains per hour made up of an hourly service from Birmingham New Street to Crewe, calling at Wolverhampton, and an hourly shuttle between Walsall and Wolverhampton.
The original Willenhall and Darlaston stations closed in 1965, the same year passenger services were halted on the Wolverhampton to Walsall line.
The line reopened to passengers in 1998 before closing again in 2008. It is now mainly used for freight.
