Metro
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Metrolink ‘Northern Circular’ proposal
MANCHESTER Metrolink’s separate routes to Bury and Rochdale could be connected as part of the Greater Manchester Combined Authority’s five-year transport plan.
A new‘Northern Circular’line via Middleton would allow travel between Oldham, Rochdale and Bury without having to go via the city centre as now.
The first stage would be an extension off the current Bury line to Middleton, an idea that Transport for Greater Manchester described in 2019 as‘making economic sense’. This would then be extended to connect with the Oldham Line.
Until 1965, Middleton had a railway station at the end of a short branch from the Manchester to Rochdale main line at Middleton Junction, from where another branch ran to Oldham Werneth, and the trackbed of both these routes remains largely undeveloped.