Midlands Rail Hub

The Midlands Rail Hub - our flagship project - is the biggest upgrade of our rail network for a generation.

What is Midlands Rail Hub?

Midlands Rail Hub is the region’s biggest and most ambitious rail improvement scheme – a £1.75bn blueprint for faster, better and more frequent connections across the Midlands.

The scheme will add up to 300 additional trains on the rail network per day into or out of Birmingham and provide faster, more frequent or new rail links for over 50 locations including: Nottingham, Leicester, Bromsgrove, Nuneaton, Worcester, Hereford and Cardiff.

Midlands Rail Hub will build two ‘chords’ at Bordesley, just east of Birmingham City Centre, as well as 10+ engineering interventions throughout the region – allowing us to offer up to 20 million extra seats for passengers through the Midlands and beyond.

• The West Chord: consists of improvements between Bordesley and Moor Street, allowing access to Birmingham Moor Street from South- West and Wales, allowing additional trains towards Worcester, Hereford, Bristol and Cardiff.
• The East Chord: creates an access to Birmingham Moor Street from the East Midlands, allowing direct access for trains from cities such as Leicester, Derby and Nottingham.

What are the benefits?

• More rail journeys: 20m additional rail seats per year, with 300 extra trains in or out of Birmingham every day
• Shorter journey times: for lines from Birmingham to places like Worcester, Cardiff and Hereford
• Boost economic growth: for every pound we invest, we generate over £1.50 in benefits, inclusive of those to the wider economy
  Safeguard jobs: Over 300+ apprenticeships will be created, along with 13,000 jobs created as part of the supply chain
• Environmentally friendly: Each parcel or person moved by rail instead of by diesel/petrol vehicle creates 76% less CO2
• Supporting housing: supporting more than 20,000 new homes built every year 

What happens next?

In February 2024, Government announced £123m of funding for design work to begin on Midlands Rail Hub. Read the story here.