Glen Innes Station level crossing removal

Overview

Every day, large numbers of people use Glen Innes Station for work, school, errands and connecting with whānau.

From next year, even more people will use the station. The City Rail Link will unlock more frequent trains and new connections, making it easier to get around Auckland. Eastern Line trains will increase to every 5 minutes during peak times, and there is the potential for more in the future.

Currently, you have to walk across the tracks to the station platform. This is called a level crossing. To provide safer access to stations and make way for more trains, we’re removing or replacing these types of crossings. Without removing level crossings there would be a higher safety risk and safety gates would be closed more often, impacting travel times.

To replace the level crossings at Glen Innes Station, we will build a new pedestrian bridge to provide safe access to the station platform.

New pedestrian bridge

We will build a new bridge to give the community a safer way to access the station and make train journeys quicker.

The new bridge will be fully accessible. This means it can be used by parents with prams, cyclists and wheelchairs. We propose putting it between the car parks to keep Glen Innes town centre connected and minimise disruption.

There are currently 2 crossings where people walk directly on the rail tracks. We will permanently close them and replace them with this new, safer, accessible pedestrian bridge. We will remove access to the station via the current Merton Road walkway. People coming from that direction will need to walk along Apirana Avenue to the new pedestrian bridge. This will take an extra 1 to 2 minutes.

We will be making it easier to walk this way by improving the shared path along Merton Road through the Links to GI project. We will finish this work by the end of 2025.

The existing underpass access to the rail station platform, located at the northern end of the station, will still be available to use.

When this will happen

To make sure we’re ready for the City Rail Link, we expect to begin main construction in December while the rail network shuts down for summer upgrade work. However, we will look to do some initial work from October. As the project timeline progresses, we will continue to update you.

Community engagement

We are working with the community, station users, and local businesses to gather feedback on the pedestrian bridge designs before any works happen. When construction starts, we will work closely with the community to minimise impact.

The designs for the footbridges and further information are now live on our Have Your Say website and open for feedback.