TRAVELLERS planning journeys by train over the Christmas period have been urged to take note of changes to services.

Trains operated by Great Western Railway (GWR) will be limited as a result of the holiday period and Network Rail work, while CrossCountry services are set to be affected by industrial action.

Customers have been advised to travel early and make sure they stay updated online so they catch wind of any changes to their journeys.

GWR is advising all customers to plan their journeys in advance and travel before Saturday where possible.

Many of the changes to the operator’s services are due to Network Rail’s continued work to modernise the Great Western mainline.

On Sunday and Wednesday trains will not be able to operate to or from London Paddington from Oxford or Didcot.

While some services will be diverted to London Marylebone these will be limited and in high demand and the majority of services will terminate at Reading or Slough.

Operations manager Rob Mullen said: “We advise customers to plan their journey in advance at GWR.com and travel on or before Saturday if possible.

“While we recognise the disruption this work will cause, and thank passengers in advance for their understanding, it is vital to enable us to run more electric trains delivering more seats and more frequent services.”

No GWR services will operate on Christmas Day or Boxing Day.

For more information go to bit.ly/2i58hm1

No Chiltern Railways services will run on Christmas Day but a special Boxing Day service of two trains per hour will run between Oxford Parkway and London Marylebone.

Its trains will not be running from Oxford station.

Trains will run between 8am and 10pm.

For more information on the operator’s timetable over the period go to chilternrailways.co.uk.

Another rail operator which will experience changes to services over Christmas is CrossCountry, which runs trains through Oxford and Banbury to the north of England and the south coast via Reading.

The RMT union has planned strikes on CrossCountry for Saturday, Sunday, Wednesday and the following Sunday, New Year's Eve, in an ongoing dispute over ‘abuse of rostering’ and Sunday working.

CrossCountry said will be running reduced services but using some longer trains to make up capacity.

Journey planning websites will be updated to reflect the changes. For more information go to crosscountrytrains.co.uk/strike