Coventry to Nuneaton Line
Bedworth railway station
Overview
Status	Operational
Owner	Network Rail
Locale	Warwickshire Coventry West Midlands (region)
Termini	Nuneaton Coventry
Stations	5
Service
Type	Commuter rail,Rail freight
System	National Rail
Operator(s)	West Midlands Trains
Rolling stock	Class 172 Class 196
History
Opened	1850
Technical
Line length	10 miles 15 chains
Number of tracks	2
Track gauge	4 ft 8+1⁄2 in (1,435 mm)standard gauge
Route map (Click to expand)

TheCoventry to Nuneaton Line is arailway line linkingCoventry andNuneaton in theWest Midlands of England. The line has a passenger service. It is also used by through freight trains, and freight trains serving facilities on the route.

The current passenger stations on the route areNuneaton,Bermuda Park,Bedworth,Coventry Arena andCoventry. Freight services run to Bedworth Murco Oil Terminal andPrologisPark Industrial Estate. The line has previously served many other small stations and now-closed goods yards.

Until 2016, the only intermediate station on the route wasBedworth. On 14 December 2011, the UK Government announced an £18.8 million project to upgrade the line, which included new stations at theRicoh Arena and Bermuda Park (opened January 2016), lengthening of the platforms at Bedworth, and increasing the service frequency from hourly to half-hourly.^[1][2][3]

The line is currently notelectrified, but it was proposed to electrify it at25 kV AC overhead as part of theElectric Spine scheme. This part of the scheme has been scrapped with other electrification projects.^[4]

All passenger services on the line are operated byWest Midlands Trains who run an hourly service in each direction between Nuneaton andLeamington Spa via Coventry andKenilworth, since 2023 this service has been branded as theElephant & Bear Line.^[5] In July 2016 it was announced that a prototype three coachClass 230 unit, would be trialled on the line for an initial period of 12 months. The unit consists of three rebuilt carriages of a formerLondon Underground D78 Stock train.^[6] After the prototype unit caught fire in December 2016, it was announced in January 2017 that the planned trial had been cancelled.^[7]

Freight trains also use the line, travelling from theChiltern Main Line viaLeamington Spa, heading towards theWest Coast Main Line.

v t e Coventry to Nuneaton line
Legend
Trent Valley line (WCML) toStafford Nuneaton North Chord Ashby & Nuneaton Joint Rly Birmingham–Peterborough line toBirmingham|New Street Nuneaton Birmingham–Peterborough line toLeicester Trent Valley line (WCML) toRugby Coventry Canal Chilvers Coton 1850–1965 Griff Colliery & Brickworks Bermuda Park 2016–0000 Charity Colliery Bedworth 1850–1965 1988–0000 Newdigate Colliery Murco Bedworth Oil Terminal Exhall Colliery Hawkesbury Lane 1850–1965 Wyken & Craven Collieries  M6  Longford & Exhall 1850–1949 Coventry Arena 2016–0000 ProLogis Park Coventry Three Spires Junction Bell Green goods station Foleshill 1850–1965 Daimler Halt 1917–1965 Coundon Road 1850–1965 Spon End Viaduct Rugby–Birmingham–Stafford line toBirmingham New Street Coventry Coventry–Leamington line Gosford Green goods station Humber Road Junction Rugby–Birmingham–Stafford line toRugby   Car park

The line was built for theLondon and North Western Railway and was opened on 2 September 1850.^[8]

On 26 January 1857, 23 of the 28 arches of theSpon End Viaduct collapsed, due to poor quality construction. This meant trains travelling south terminated atCoundon Road while the viaduct was rebuilt. This took three and a half years to complete and services to Coventry were restored on 1 October 1860.^[8]

The line originally had intermediate stations atCoundon Road,Foleshill,Longford and Exhall,Hawkesbury Lane,Bedworth andChilvers Coton. In 1917,Daimler Halt was opened between Coundon Road and Foleshill. But this was a private halt for the use of workers at the adjacentDaimler factory, and was not accessible to the general public. There were also various branches and sidings running from the line to serve local coal mines and factories, the longest of which was the 'Coventry Loop Line' (see below)^[8]

The line came under the ownership of theLondon, Midland and Scottish Railway (LMS) in 1923, and thenBritish Railways in 1948. The little-used Longford and Exhall station was closed in 1949. All of the other intermediate stations were closed on 18 January 1965 (along with those on theCoventry to Leamington Line) when passenger services were withdrawn as a consequence ofThe Reshaping of British Railways report. Following this, the line became freight-only for the next 22 years.^[8]

British Rail restored passenger services to the line on 11 May 1987, under theSpeller Act. Initially there were no intermediate stations on the re-opened line until 16 May 1988 when the rebuilt Bedworth station was opened.^[8]

The Coventry Loop Line was a freight-only branch which ran from Three Spires Junction on the Coventry–Nuneaton Line to Humber Road Junction on theCoventry–Rugby Line. The line was built so freight trains could avoid running through Coventry station, and was first opened in 1914. It had twogoods stations at Bell Green and Gosford Green, as well as a number of sidings serving local industries,^[9] but never had any scheduled passenger service, although passenger trains occasionally used the line as a diversionary route during engineering works.^[8]

Humber Road Junction was closed in 1963, after goods traffic dwindled, and so the branch became a long siding from Three Spires Junction. The last traffic to theChrysler factory ended in 1981, and the rest of the branch closed in September that year. The track was lifted in 1982.^[8] Much of the former trackbed of the line has since been built over as part of theA444 Phoenix Way.^[9]

The line runs near to theCoventry Building Society Arena stadium on the northern edge of Coventry. Funding for two new stations,Coventry Arena andBermuda Park, was approved in December 2011.^[2]New plans will also see the number of carriages increased from 1 to 3 and the service upgraded to half hourly, a new platform built at Coventry station and also future extensions of the line toKenilworth andLeamington Spa.^[10] After the completion of theElectric Spine project, such a service would be operated byelectric multiple units.

On 26 June 2014Buckingham Group were announced as the company awarded the contract to build the two new stations.^[11]

Work on building the stations started in October 2014^[12] with the stations opening on 18 January 2016,^[13] however the upgrade at Coventry station to allow additional train services between Coventry and Nuneaton, calling at the new stations, will not be ready until summer 2017.^[14]

From 19 May 2019, services on the Coventry to Nuneaton route have been significantly upgraded byWest Midlands Trains, with the single-car Class 153s replaced by 2-carClass 172 units. Saturdays (which will coincide with games at theCoventry Building Society Arena) will see three trains per hour in each direction.^[15] The line is also connected with the Coventry to Leamington Spa line, with direct trains from Nuneaton to Leamington Spa. In December 2021West Midlands Trains once again declared their failure to run services on the line, as well as theCoventry–Leamington line, until at least the end of January 2022. This followed their failure in early 2021 to maintain a service.^[16]

In 2019 a report by Midlands Connect proposed reinstating direct services between Coventry andLeicester, for the first time since 2004, by reinstating a "dive under" under the West Coast Main Line at Nuneaton, connecting the Coventry-Nuneaton line to theNuneaton-Leicester line. Currently this journey is only possible by changing at Nuneaton.^[17][18][19]

In 2023,Transport for West Midlands (TfWM) and theWest Midlands Rail Executive (WMRE) put forward plans to reopenFoleshill railway station.^[20]

• Coventry to Leamington line

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