Murphy Begins Refurbishment Of Historic Station

J Murphy & Sons has begun work on one of the highest and oldest stations on the Liverpool to Manchester railway line, having being awarded a £900,000 Station Refurbishment contract by Network Rail at Newton Le Willows station, on Merseyside.  

Since the 19th century Newton's history has been very closely linked with the development of the world's railway. It was little more than a village when the famous Vulcan Foundry was opened in 1831 which later developed into one of the world's foremost locomotive manufacturers. The station is an attractive Georgian building in keeping with its surroundings, and as a result Murphy’s contract will conserve the station’s original appearance.

Murphy was awarded the scheme by Network Rail as part of the Operational Property Framework Agreement, a £100 million Design and Build contract. It sees the two companies partnering to successfully deliver a range of large and small station renewals projects from London, up to the North West and Merseyside, and beyond to Cumbria and the Scottish border.

Detailing the project, Murphy’s site manager Gavin Trelfa, said:

“To allow us to work full-time on refurbishing the building with no weather restrictions over the next five months, and to maintain the internal features from damage, we are providing a fully-encapsulated scaffolding." 

“This will allow us to completely strip the existing slated roof and replace with new welsh slates, clean the existing brick façade and re-point in lime mortar, carry out stone work repairs and replace damaged stone copers with new ones, within a tight time-frame.”

Other features of the contract include the installation of new damp proof membranes to prevent water ingress through the roof and brickwork and the relocation of the existing station booking office to allow the station to maintain operations, whilst this work is in progress.

Gavin continues:

“Given the station’s history, this is an interesting project which will be sensitively restored by Murphy back to its former glory. We will be working with bodies such as English Heritage closely, to respect the history of the station and the area, which played such an important part in the development of the first purpose built railway, making the transport of goods and passengers easy.”