Redhill to Tonbridge line reopens after 208 sheet piles installed in Godstone embankment

Trains are running again between Redhill and Tonbridge after Network Rail engineers installed 208 sheet piles into an embankment near Godstone where ground movement had been detected, during a five-day emergency closure that started on Wednesday 28 October.

Network Rail said on Monday 2 November that services had resumed on the line linking Surrey and Kent. The closure followed the detection of ground movement beneath the track at Godstone by engineers monitoring embankments in the Surrey area.

Each of the 208 sheet piles is 10 metres long, and together they run along a 126-metre stretch of embankment. The scope delivered matches what Network Rail set out when it announced the closure on Friday 23 October. The infrastructure owner said the work had strengthened and stabilised the railway and prevented further movement.

Nad Campbell, Project Manager for Network Rail, said: "Engineers worked day and night to carry out these vital repairs and prevent a longer closure."

The closure

Network Rail imposed a speed restriction on the line after the movement was detected so that trains could keep running safely until the works started. Engineers used the closure to carry out additional track maintenance, which the company said would help remove some of the speed restrictions that had been slowing trains on the route.

The company said it timed the closure for the school half term because many of the line's local users are school children. Rail replacement buses ran between Redhill and Tonbridge across the five days, calling at all stations and additionally at Edenbridge Town for connections with Uckfield line trains. The car park at Redhill station was partially closed from Sunday 25 October to accommodate the buses.

Network Rail said the Godstone emergency work was separate from a long-planned closure between Tonbridge and Wadhurst affecting South Eastern services from 24 October to 1 November.

Announcing the closure, Campbell said Network Rail had not taken the decision lightly and apologised for the short notice. Tom Easdown, Southern's Head of Stations, also apologised for the disruption and said Southern was pleased to have restored services for customers and the local community.

A line with a history of earthworks trouble

The Godstone piling is the latest in a series of embankment interventions on the Redhill to Tonbridge line that Network Rail has itself documented over the past seven years.

On 22 December 2019 the company reported a significant earthworks failure near Godstone, attributing it to five days of heavy rainfall. It later said the landslip followed a month of rain in one week on already saturated ground, and the line was planned to reopen by the end of March 2020.

In March 2024 Network Rail closed the line for at least two weeks for emergency embankment repairs, saying it had dealt with repeated track defects at the site because of movement in the embankment carrying the railway. Mark Killick, Network Rail's Engineering and Asset Management Director, said at the time that the area had seen "the wettest February in this part of the country for 200 years".

Most recently, the line was closed for nine days from 16 to 25 August 2025 for planned engineering work announced in June that year. Network Rail said that closure would see an embankment near Edenbridge, where it said landslips had caused significant disruption in recent years, strengthened with a steel wall reinforced by 226 soil nails, each nine metres long. The company said the same closure would also see 200m of rail replaced at Godstone, detailed structural inspections of 11 bridges, and the renewal of 13 miles of 12,000-volt feeder cables between Nutfield and Leigh.

Network Rail owns, operates and develops Britain's railway infrastructure, including 20,000 miles of track.