SOUTH West Trains’ multi-million pound investment to provide extra space for 23,000 passengers travelling at peak times is complete.

The £65m investment will see a full fleet of 108 refurbished extra carriages in service on what is one of Europe’s busiest railways.

The improvements are part of the Government’s High Level Output Specification Programme and are the biggest made to the network in decades.

For Farnham and Alton, the morning services to London Waterloo to benefit from the improvements will be the 7.39am train from Farnham station, and the 8.44am train from Alton.

For the evening rush hour, the 17.05 train from London Waterloo to Farnham will fall under the services benefitting from the bigger services, as will the 18.25 leaving the capital to Alton.

In addition to the 1,449 carriages in service today, a further 150 new carriages will start to be introduced in 2017, providing even more space for the half-a-million passenger journeys on the network every day.

Rail Minister Claire Perry said: “We are investing £40bn in our nation’s railway infrastructure, the biggest upgrade since the Victorian times. The introduction of these 108 modified train carriages on to the South West Trains network is providing a significant increase to peak time capacity into the capital and beyond.

“From 2017, as part of an £800m investment in the route, passengers will benefit from a bigger and better London Waterloo station and a further 150 new train carriages, providing even more space for passengers arriving there over the morning rush hour.”