South Wales & Deeside Parkway Stations

[AllWork]

The BBC has flagged that there is due to be an announcement on progressing funding for 7 new stations today (18 Feb 2026):

Transport for Wales's (TFW) improvements plan is in addition to building stations at Magor and Undy, Llanwern, Cardiff East, Newport West, Somerton, Cardiff Parkway and Deeside industrial park, which have already been proposed.

Additional infrastructure apparently also part of the announcements.

Wales trains: New stations in £14bn UK government rail funding promise

Sir Keir Starmer backs long list of Welsh railway projects, including seven new stations.

www.bbc.co.uk

I can see the value of some of these but Deeside Industrial Park continues to perplex me. It's only really of value to people travelling to/from Liverpool as most of the businesses are closer (walking) to Hawarden Bridge (or even Shotton) if coming from the Wrexham direction.

 

[LNW-GW Joint]

This appears to be a much bigger announcement than for a few new stations on the TfW network. It appears to the endorsement of the WG vision for rail recently published by TfW, and a figure of £14 billion is being bandied about, though with uncertain timescales.
There just happens to be an election in the offing, and it silences the debate about rail devolution in Wales, and issues about cooperation between Cardiff Bay and Westminster governments.
The funds appear to be an increase for Network Rail to deliver a raft of improvements, and including in the Borders part of W&B (eg at Chester and Shrewsbury).

This is the DFT announcement, ahead of the PM's speech today:

Prime Minister announces seven new stations and major rail funding commitment

A generational UK Government commitment to modernise Welsh rail is set to support 12,000 jobs across Wales.

www.gov.uk

The UK Government endorses the TfW vision and agrees that it will form the basis of the Wales Rail Board’s pipeline of projects. UK Government also commits to working in partnership with the Welsh Government to deliver this pipeline as quickly as possible.

This represents a generational commitment to rail in Wales that began with the investments already made at the comprehensive spending review.

While the total cost of that pipeline of projects will change over time as the industry and these schemes develop, TfW currently estimate the total cost of all the schemes under consideration to be up to £14 billion. The pipeline is a generational transformational commitment, with exact, additional UKG funding allocations to be confirmed at future Spending Reviews.

The immediate funding of about £0.5 billion is for the 7 new stations and some other short-term local improvements.

And this is the WG/TfW visionary document covering all the areas where future funding is sought:

Frontify

brand.tfw.wales

This is too long to quote and is in a complex format.

 

[AllWork]

Thanks for that link. So now new money then, just re-announcing. I wonder how this will go down pre-election.

 

[Cardiff123]

This appears to be a much bigger announcement than for a few new stations on the TfW network. It appears to the endorsement of the WG vision for rail recently published by TfW, and a figure of £14 billion is being bandied about, though with uncertain timescales.
There just happens to be an election in the offing, and it silences the debate about rail devolution in Wales, and issues about cooperation between Cardiff Bay and Westminster governments.
The funds appear to be an increase for Network Rail to deliver a raft of improvements, and including in the Borders part of W&B (eg at Chester and Shrewsbury).

This is the DFT announcement, ahead of the PM's speech today:

Prime Minister announces seven new stations and major rail funding commitment

A generational UK Government commitment to modernise Welsh rail is set to support 12,000 jobs across Wales.

www.gov.uk

The immediate funding of about £0.5 billion is for the 7 new stations and some other short-term local improvements.

And this is the WG/TfW visionary document covering all the areas where future funding is sought:

Frontify

brand.tfw.wales

This is too long to quote and is in a complex format.

Here's the much more detailed TfW plans - these are currently all ambitions beyond the £445 million of committed funds announced at the last UK Govt spending review.
All that's been committed to and is fully funded so far is below.......and this is a re-announcement

Short term

Cardiff Central station upgrades.
Service or frequency improvements to the City Line to enable four trains per hour.
Level crossing upgrades for Network North Wales and more services.
Progressing five new stations on the South Wales Main Line (‘Burns Stations’), improvements to the relief lines and new cross-border services.

As you say, an election is nearing and Welsh Labour are desperate to shut down the debate of rail infrastructure funding in Wales

Today, Tomorrow, Together | Transport for Wales

Transport for Wales | Buy Cheap Train Tickets and Check Train Times

tfw.wales

https://tfw.wales/sites/default/files/2026-02/TTT-Final_ENG.pdf

 

[Smwrff]

The report is called Today, Tomorrow, Together.
Which conveniently misses Yesterday which is when all of these 'new' stations were announced.

 

[Djgr]

The BBC has flagged that there is due to be an announcement on progressing funding for 7 new stations today (18 Feb 2026):



Additional infrastructure apparently also part of the announcements.

Wales trains: New stations in £14bn UK government rail funding promise

Sir Keir Starmer backs long list of Welsh railway projects, including seven new stations.

www.bbc.co.uk

I can see the value of some of these but Deeside Industrial Park continues to perplex me. It's only really of value to people travelling to/from Liverpool as most of the businesses are closer (walking) to Hawarden Bridge (or even Shotton) if coming from the Wrexham direction.

I think the idea is that Deeside Industrial Park could be developed as a proper public transport interchange for the Industrial Park (where viable non-car travel-to-work options are pretty poor), in a way that Hawarden Bridge/Pont Penarlag could never be.

I am sure that a fair proportion of the workforce come from the English side of the border and so being closer to that is not automatically a bad thing.

 

[Chester1]

I think the idea is that Deeside Industrial Park could be developed as a proper public transport interchange for the Industrial Park (where viable non-car travel-to-work options are pretty poor), in a way that Hawarden Bridge/Pont Penarlag could never be.

I am sure that a fair proportion of the workforce come from the English side of the border and so being closer to that is not automatically a bad thing.

Deeside Industrial Park is huge and I am sure the BCR will reflect that much of it will be out of walking distance of any station. I briefly worked on a project there a few years back and the bus provision bordered on non existent. It is designed for cars.

 

[AllWork]

Deeside Industrial Park is huge and I am sure the BCR will reflect that much of it will be out of walking distance of any station. I briefly worked on a project there a few years back and the bus provision bordered on non existent. It is designed for cars.

I expect the BCR will hugely overweight the impact of rail passengers to be honest. You’re right and the station location is not good for most of the actual jobs.

Personally I can’t see how it stacks up unless the plan is to split the line there so Merseyrail can have the rest!

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 18 Feb 2026 ==

I think the idea is that Deeside Industrial Park could be developed as a proper public transport interchange for the Industrial Park (where viable non-car travel-to-work options are pretty poor), in a way that Hawarden Bridge/Pont Penarlag could never be.

I am sure that a fair proportion of the workforce come from the English side of the border and so being closer to that is not automatically a bad thing.

I’m unsure how it could be an interchange though - from what to what? Free buses have been tried on site as have park and ride and no takers. It’s not even an attractive park and ride to Liverpool because it’s close enough to Hooton to just keep driving and have lots more options.

 

[Snow1964]

Having read further, the only new committed funding appears to be :

£30m towards improving Cardiff West junction to increase capacity during remodelling in 2028,

Governments share of co-funding (£ not specified) near Padeswood cement works to increase line capacity (which might be not much more than some intermediate signals) to allow half hourly service to Wrexham.

£30m for some safety and accessibility, with 2 accessible footbridges replacing 4 high risk level crossings between Prestatyn and Abergele.

Everything else appears to just be previously funded schemes mentioned again.

 

[Llandudno]

I expect the BCR will hugely overweight the impact of rail passengers to be honest. You’re right and the station location is not good for most of the actual jobs.

Personally I can’t see how it stacks up unless the plan is to split the line there so Merseyrail can have the rest!

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 18 Feb 2026 ==



I’m unsure how it could be an interchange though - from what to what? Free buses have been tried on site as have park and ride and no takers. It’s not even an attractive park and ride to Liverpool because it’s close enough to Hooton to just keep driving and have lots more options.

and cheaper fares from Hooton with its huge, secure and cheap to use car park and 6 direct trains per hour to Liverpool…

 

[AllWork]

I thought those bridges were also pre announced (as the speeding up of the mainline?).

 

[LNW-GW Joint]

Governments share of co-funding (£ not specified) near Padeswood cement works to increase line capacity (which might be not much more than some intermediate signals) to allow half hourly service to Wrexham.

There will be new southern access to Padeswood sidings to remove the need to block the line to reverse in from the north, for incoming trains.
It will also eliminate the need for outbound trains to run north to Dee Marsh Jn (reverse) and run back up Aston bank to reach Wrexham.
That work won't be cheap, and Penyffordd signal box will need to be upgraded.
It also assumes continuing production contracts from the cement plant (the Hinckley Point contract, which currently takes trains to Avonmouth, won't last forever).

 

[John R]

Everything else appears to just be previously funded schemes mentioned again.

I’d still rather that than the Westminster Government’s habit of cancelling previously announced schemes.

 

[Baxenden Bank]

Some assessment figures taken from a 2019 report (named below), which sort of led to where they are today.

Source: New Rail Stations Prioritisation – Stage 2 Assessment Report, April 2019

Station Demand Forecasts
9. A model has been developed by Southampton University to provide a standardised assessment of the demand at each station (attached at Appendix 3). The model provides two demand forecasts for each station. The first forecast simply assigns the population from each postcode to its nearest station (‘deterministic’ catchment). The second apportions the population of each postcode to ten alternative stations, based on the estimated probability of each of these stations being chosen (‘probabilistic’ catchment).

10. The forecasts provided by this type of model are indicative and are intended to provide an indication of the likely viability of a proposed station at a particular site, rather than a detailed prediction of travel patterns following station opening. The forecasts from the model do not take into account trip destination, the destinations served by a station or atypical local factors such as sports stadia or tourist attractions whose demand impacts cannot be adequately represented in the model. The results (see Table 1) should therefore be considered alongside expert knowledge of conditions relating to any particular station site.

Table 1: Summary station demand forecasts using models with deterministic and probabilistic catchments for model base year (2011/12) and with growth uplift applied (2015/16)
Proposed Station	Predicted annual entries/exits
	Deterministic catchment		Probabilistic catchment
	2011/2012	2015/2016	2011/2012	2015/2016
Cockett	106,093​	117,212​	130,932​	144,654​
Ely Mill	116,133​	128,304​	92,137​	101,793​
Llanwern	334,951​	370,054​	346,411​	382,715​
Newport Road/Rover Way	319,390​	352,862​	212,388​	234,591​
Landore	26,407​	29,174​	31,348​	34,633​
St Clears	98,306​	108,608​	90,362​	99,832​
Deeside Industrial Park	37,361​	41,276​	50,685​	55,997​
North Wrexham	56,959​	62,928​	64,043​	70,755​
South Wrexham	88,882​	98,197​	102,859​	113,639​
Llangefni	241,760​	267,096​	225,896​	249,570​
St Mellons/Cardiff Parkway	193,303​	213,561​	141,467​	156,293​
Carno	35,273​	38,970​	26,845​	29,658​

 

[MikePJ]

Having read further, the only new committed funding appears to be :

£30m towards improving Cardiff West junction to increase capacity during remodelling in 2028,

Governments share of co-funding (£ not specified) near Padeswood cement works to increase line capacity (which might be not much more than some intermediate signals) to allow half hourly service to Wrexham.

£30m for some safety and accessibility, with 2 accessible footbridges replacing 4 high risk level crossings between Prestatyn and Abergele.

Everything else appears to just be previously funded schemes mentioned again.

Cardiff West was at least mentioned in the Spending Review in the summer.

Pulling out a few South Wales Metro things that caught my eye in the vision document:

- "part-electrification" between Cardiff and Cogan to enable the use of tram-trains to Penarth.
- Extension to Hirwaun, and then onwards in a further phase to the former Tower Colliery
- New stations at Roath Park and Gabalfa
- Coryton-Radyr ("City Circle") talked about as a long-term aspiration and given a rough costing

 

[Snow1964]

There are other stations in the 38 page document, St Clears, Crockett (Swansea) plus Swansea District line etc. These are all unfunded at the moment.

https://tfw.wales/sites/default/files/2026-02/TTT-Final_ENG.pdf

Having checked another planning document, appears the majority of the Burns stations will have an island platform 170m long on slow/relief lines (where one track is slewed around other side of island). 170m allows 8x20m EMUs, although it appears initially they will be served by extending services from South West Wales that currently terminate at Cardiff, so will be 197 operated.

The document suggests electrification should include Swansea area, and continue to Burry Port & Pembray (where turn back will be added). Although presumably BEMUs could continue to Carmarthen, or bimodes into Pembrokeshire branches.

No idea how much will actually happen and get funded, but if usage continues to increase in Wales, then fairly obvious going to need to order more trains soon. Looks like they are going to need BEMUs or bimodes, and presumably eventually the 197s would migrate to the mainly non-electrified bits if those areas needed longer trains.

 

[MikePJ]

Ken Skates ordered procurement to start on new trains back in June, but didn't say what kind of trains. https://www.modernrailways.com/article/tfw-told-start-procuring-more-new-trains

“I’ve instructed Transport for Wales to start the process of ordering even more new trains to support these new services,”