Temporary car park for Penrith station during £2.5m work to create more spaces

Work is to start this month on a new single-deck car park at Penrith railway station, to be built on the existing site.

The £2.5m scheme will provide 30 additional spaces, bringing the total at the station to 125.

It will take approximately five months to complete the work. The existing car park will close during this time and will be replaced from Thursday 11 November by a temporary car park a short walk away.

The allternative parking arranged by Virgin Trains will be provided at Davidsons Junction 40 Truck Stop on Ullswater Road. Long-term spaces for holders of blue badges will continue to be provided at the station, where there will also still be short-stay spaces for people parking for up to 20 minutes to meet or drop off rail passengers.

The new car park is part of a joint project by Network Rail and Virgin Trains to replace or extend car parks at stations managed by Virgin Trains on the West Coast Mainline, at a total cost of around £90m.

Stuart Davison, Station Manager for Virgin Trains in Cumbria, said: “The limited room for customers’ cars at Penrith has caused problems at this increasingly busy station. While improvement work goes on, passengers will need to allow more time to walk from the temporary car park before boarding their trains. However, the end result will be the addition of over 30 per cent more parking spaces and I am sure that will be very welcome.”

Jo Kaye, Network Rail route director, said: “Providing car parking at railway stations is all about true transport integration – passengers driving short distances to the station to then use the railway they rely on for the longer part of their journey.”

It is being built to a German design, used on other car parks in the project, and will be a steel construction. The deck will be concrete cast over steel and covered in a coloured surface called Conideck, which is applied to reduce tyre noise. The outside will be clad in steel and wood panelling.

The contractor building the car park for Network Rail is Balfour Beatty, who have built several other car parks in the overall project.

The station is used by around 370,000 passengers a year, an increase of about 125,000 since 2005.

Penrith is 281 miles from London and 120 miles from Glasgow on the West Coast Mainline. The fastest journey time to London by Virgin Pendolino train is three hours and the best from Glasgow is one hour and 23 minutes.

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