News has just broken from The Chronicle that the Northumberland Line is expected to reach 250,000 trips by Easter 2025; mere months after opening in December 2025, and with only half of the stations opened.
This is excellent news for the route, which has seen reopening campaigns since the mid 1970’s, with a meeting between the then MP for Morpeth, George Grant meeting with Eric Heffer MP, the then Minister for Industry.
Looking forward, it is a fairly safe assumption that the Northumberland Line may see 500,000 passengers by the first anniversary of the line reopening to passengers in December 2025.
It also lends a strong case to expansion of the route; with several possibilities available, but two within easy reach could use existing track and stations to provide a expanded service.
Newcastle – Morpeth – Bedlington
This route has long been argued for, and was at one time seen as a way to initiate the return of services to Bedlington as a first phase of reopening.
It is now understood to be in the works for starting once Bedlington station is completed, allowing units currently idle at Coopies Lane sidings to run to Bedlington and back, giving an east-west connection.
Hopefully with Bedlington station due to complete by December 2025, this service may be introduced alongside?
Newcastle – Bedlington – Pegswood – Berwick – Edinburgh
This campaign was established to combat the potential oversight of this route by other campaigns.
It is very much an ‘train ready route’, as it was used earlier this month for the SRPS ‘The Seven Counties Rambler’ railtour to offer a through north-south link between Newcastle and Edinburgh via Bedlington.
If the Newcastle, Morpeth, and Bedlington route is ready to go, this one should also be a quick one to implement too.
This route would offer a few key advantages;
- Additional trains alongside the Northumberland Line service would offer additional seating capacity, which is a known problem on the line given its popularity and would offer a potentially quick fix to this.
- Would avoid passengers bound for North Northumberland/Scotland needing to travel south to Newcastle to make onward connections, and taking up capacity in that direction, and instead would board direct trains headed northwards, or on return, would vacate seats at station such as Blyth Bebside to be occupied by other passengers heading into Newcastle or beyond.
- Builds on the proposed use of Morpeth – Bedlington services to support the proposed new station at Choppington, and would only require the short chord from Hepscott Junction to Morpeth North Junction to enable this route, with Hepscott Junction to Bedlington Junction being shared with other passenger services.
If you’d like to support this route, please sign the petition here.
Other extensions
This campaign supports all other extensions to the Northumberland Line such as that to Newbiggin by the Sea, which are campaigned for elsewhere.
The Northumberland Coast Loop 