First Great British Railways station to open next month

Key Points

Cambridge South station will open on 28 June and is the first station in the UK to operate under the Great British Railways branding.
Nine trains per hour will run from the station to the city centre, and trains will also depart to Birmingham, London, and Stansted International Airport.
The station has a direct link to Cambridge's Biomedical Campus, a national research and economic hub that is expected to contribute greatly to the UK economy in coming years.

The new Cambridge South Station is set to open next month and will be the first station in the country to feature Great British Railways branding.

Originally slated to open last year, the station was delayed due to issues with the installation of electrics and will now begin operating on Sunday 28 June. It features Great British Railways signage, making it the first station in the country to be directly branded under the publicly-owned rail organisation.

Cambridge South will welcome 1.8 million passengers per year and will offer rail services to London, Birmingham, and Stansted Airport, as well as nine trains per hour to the centre of Cambridge.

It also features a direct link to Cambridge’s Biomedical Campus, a national research and economic hub that is expected to contribute £18.2 billion to UK GDP by 2050 and grow to 40,000 employees. Once the East West rail line is completed, an project which had initially set a deadline for 2030, Cambridge South will serve passengers travelling to Oxford.

Cambridge South station has received more than £250 million of government funding, as well as £5 million contributions from AstraZeneca, Cambridge & Peterborough Combined Authority, and the Greater Cambridgeshire Partnership.

Great British Railways is the government’s publicly owned rail operator, which aims to consolidate the more than 17 different rail organisations in the country under a single state-operated entity.

Currently, 8 train operators are under public ownership, and Great British Railways operators manage more than 1,100 stations in the UK. Through nationalising rail services, the government aims to make it easier to travel across the country, reduce fares and inefficiencies, and allow customers to purchase a single ticket usable across multiple operators.

The public ownership programme behind Great British Railways is expected to be completed by the end of 2027.

“As the first new Great British Railways branded station, the opening is an important milestone for our railways and a sign of the real change public ownership will deliver,” said Rail Minister Lord Peter Hendy.

“Faster connections supporting economic growth, thousands more jobs and homes and a railway that works for the communities it serves.”