PLANS for a railway station to be built in Kenyon could be back on track.

Residents and politicians have long been campaigning for a station to return to Kenyon Junction.

The junction and nearby Leigh station both closed in 1969 and proposals for new railway links in the borough were rejected in favour of £68 million being spent on building the guided busway.

But Transport for Greater Manchester (TfGM) has now revealed that it will be preparing a 10-year transport plan after the city region’s first mayor has been elected next month and that a new railway station at ‘Kenyon Junction will be considered’.

Lowton East Neighbourhood Development Forum (LENDF) chairman Ed Thwaite has been campaigning for a station to be built at Kenyon Junction for five years. He says reconnecting Leigh, Lowton and other areas to regular railway services to Manchester and Liverpool is a ‘no-brainer’.

“As we know there is no railway station in Leigh and Lowton and surrounding areas and this needs to change,” he says.

“In fact something should have been done about it years ago.

“We already have an active line that runs through the area, so we just need the station now.

“With all the new housing projects being approved in the area there will obviously be even more traffic. A new station would help with that significantly.

“This would also be vital in cutting pollution and congestion.

“A pod station at Kenyon Junction would cost around £6.5 million to build and there is enough land to fit 1,000 car parking spaces there too.

“It is basically one field away from the end of the Atherleigh Way bypass where it joins the East Lancs Road.”

Mr Thwaite says a station at Kenyon Junction could serve Culcheth and Glazebury.