THE chair of a Lakes rail group has warned that there will be train timetable changes beginning from early next week.

Chair of the Lakes Line Rail Users Group Robert Talbot said beginning from Monday some services would be operating a two-hourly service due to the current Covid-19 lockdown.

He said: "Both the Lakes line and the Furness line have been reduced to a two-hourly service.

"There have been some additions.

"On the Lakes line we know there will be a couple of extra trains before the two-hourly patterns start and there will be a couple in the early evening.

"That is the service between Oxenholme and Windermere.

"The mainline Avanti West Coast service is reverting to what it had before early last year, an hourly service down to London and up to Glasgow."

Mr Talbot added that there would be hourly services running from Carlisle and Preston to Glasgow and Edinburgh.

"Northern are saying that they will review it in four weeks but I cannot imagine we'll get any uplift in service before Easter," he said.

"But that depends on national circumstances."