TAKING the train proved a pain for hundreds of Trans-Pennine rail passengers yesterday.

The heavily-used rail line between Huddersfield and Manchester Victoria and Manchester Airport will be closed all week.

Major track and station improvements at Stalybridge mean only a few early morning and late night Trans-Pennine services will run until Monday. Other local services are also affected.

Replacement buses are operating instead between Huddersfield, Stockport and Manchester Airport.

There are up to 50,000 people per day making journeys to or from stations between Manchester and Leeds with 2,000 alone travelling directly between Manchester and Leeds on First TransPennine Express services.

Some 270,000 journeys will be affected on TransPennine Express services during the nine-day blockade.

Marsden and Slaithwaite faced being cut off completely but a single early morning commuter train is running to Huddersfield and Leeds.

Holidaymakers and families during half-term were among those hit by delays and inconvenience at Huddersfield Station yesterday.

Adrian O’Hara and his family of five, from Dewsbury, were heading to Manchester Airport for a break.

“We got to Dewsbury Station but there were delays at Selby so we had to get a taxi from Dewsbury to Huddersfield. Then we got here to find out about this closure,” he said.

“We’ve left plenty of time but it’s probably cost us about an hour.”

Care worker Mark Trowell, 31, of Fartown, was left fuming as he set off to see friends in Bolton.

“The bus will probably take twice as long and I haven’t been offered any reduction,” he said.

“I have paid £15.60 but it wouldn’t have cost me that if I’d have gone to the bus station.

“The advice I got at the rail station wasn’t great and I had to ask someone outside where the bus went from. I’m not very impressed.”

Trevor Schofield, 63, of Taylor Hill, was also Manchester Airport-bound with son Richard, 36, and granddaughter Alaylana, three.

Trevor, heading for a family reunion in Spain, said: “We usually take the train to the airport because it’s convenient but maybe it’s not this time! If my sister-in-law hadn’t phoned us about the closure we wouldn’t have known.”

IT consultant Vasim Memon, 37, of Leeds, flies to Copenhagen every Monday for business.

“I didn’t know about the closure, even though the station staff say we had been informed.

“The bus takes an hour and 10 minutes to the airport so I should just about make it on time.”

Mike and Pamela Hirst, of Fenay Bridge, were off to Leeds and found a reduced service.

“Trains are usually every quarter of an hour but there’s nothing now for half-an-hour,” said Mr Hirst. “It’ll be worse for commuters than us but if this work has to be done, it has to be done.”

The closure is part of a long-running £20 million engineering project.

It includes replacement of the track and signalling in and around Stalybridge station and also sees alterations to the platforms, coffee shop and other passenger facilities.

The speed limit of trains passing through Stalybridge will increase from 40mph to 50mph as a result of the track and signalling work.

First Trans-Pennine Express and Northern Rail are working together to keep disruption to a minimum.

A First spokesman said everything went smoothly yesterday morning and there were extra staff on hand to help passengers.

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