Engineering work which will affect some Midlands rail passengers over Easter has been defended by Network Rail.
Euston station in London will be closed to Virgin West Coast services between Saturday and Monday as work is due on the West Coast line at Rugby, Warks.
A replacement bus service will operate from Birmingham International.
Keith Lumley, from Network Rail, said Easter was a quieter time for travel without normal business travellers and daily commuter passengers.
Massive disruption
He said: "Most people will have made their travel arrangements and gone away before Good Friday and a lot of them will have taken the following week off work.
"Effectively you won't get any further south than either Birmingham International or Coventry station and you'll have to complete the remainder of the journey on a replacement coach service.
"It's going to be an hour-plus to journey times."
In February Network Rail was fined a record £14m by the Office of Rail Regulation, relating mainly to work at Rugby in late December and January.
This over-ran by four days, severing the West Coast Main Line and causing massive disruption.
Phil Davies, from the West Midlands passenger watchdog Travel Watch, said the line had to be upgraded, but added: "We just hope that they can get their act together.
"Clearly what happened at the New Year was just unacceptable.
"It looks as though you can't use the train and I very much regret that, as someone who wants to see people using the train, rather than the roads.
"The roads are going to be very congested."
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