New Ashley Down railway station construction gets under way

Work on the new station at Ashley Down has begun

Construction work on a new train station in Bristol has got under way, the region's metro mayor says.

The station, at Ashley Down, will be between Temple Meads and Filton Abbey Wood, with services eventually running to the new YTL Arena in Filton.

It will be built on Station Road, just south of the Ashley Down allotments and should be completed in 2024.

Dan Norris described the reopening as "reverse Beeching", referring to cuts in the 1960s which saw stations close.

The station is one of several planned to open in Bristol in the next few years

"The last time there was a station here, man hadn't yet stepped on the moon," he added.

"Improving public transport is so important to help people get from A to B in the West of England, and to meet our ambitious net-zero targets locally."

Background - Paul Barltrop, BBC West political editor

The idea of new stations and more trains is popular. But the reality is far harder to achieve.

It is a decade since political leaders set out a vision for the future of suburban rail services around the Bristol area. They called it MetroWest - and produced colourful maps showing what was coming.

Roll forward to today and not one new station has yet opened.

Portway is nearly there - but has overrun by a million pounds and a year.

And while work is starting at Ashley Down, elsewhere there's delay.

With money tight, and passenger numbers struggling to return to pre-pandemic levels, big railway improvements won't happen fast.

The site used to be home to Ashley Hill Station, which closed in 1964 as part of the Beeching cuts, which saw roughly 5,000 miles of track closed and more than 2,300 stations axed in the 1960s, mainly in rural areas.

Ashley Down station is part of the MetroWest Phase 2 project, which will also see new train stations built at North Filton next to the new arena, and at Henbury.

Ashley Down Station is part of Phase 2 of the MetroWest public transport plan