Christmas and New Year rail improvement works valued at more than £109m have been completed without any major overruns. A spokesman for Network Rail said that relatively mild winter weather had helped engineering teams finish projects on schedule. Commuters returning to work on Tuesday (3 January) following the Christmas break encountered disruption to train services but this was caused by severe gales rather than overrunning engineering works. Among the headline Christmas projects the first of two new bridges over Cow Lane in Reading was installed. This involved demolishing the old brick arch structure (pictured below) and wheeling in a prefab concrete structure on a Mammoet multi-wheeled trolley. Contractor BAM Nuttall's work was made harder by waterlogged ground conditions which put back installation of the bridge from Boxing Day afternoon to Tuesday morning. The entire job was reportedly finished with minutes to spare. On the other side of Reading station the new platform 4 has...

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Source: Transport Briefing