Grand National 2023: Road closures and travel advice for Aintree Racecourse, including trains and bus services

Thousands of visitors as set to descend on Sefton and Liverpool this week for the world famous Grand National Festival, which will run over three days at Aintree Racecourse.

Merseyside Police, Merseytravel and Sefton Council are working together to create as little disruption across the borough as possible, and help festival goers get to and from Aintree smoothly throughout the weekend.

This means that a number of road closures and diverstions will be in place from Thursday 13 April to Saturday 15 April, but, Merseyrail will be running a special seven-and-a-half minute train service to lessen the blow.

The council advises that racegoers make us of Merseyrail services, alighting at Aintree Station.

Road closures and diversions:

• Local residents not attending the festival are advised to avoid the A59 Ormskirk Road from Switch Island through to the Black Bull junction.
• Ormskirk Road, as well as Park Lane between Bridle Road and Ormskirk Road, will be closed between 4pm and 9pm on all three festival days. Heavy traffic is expected on the A59 from 10am – 2pm.
• During the closure, traffic will be diverted via Switch Island, Dunnings Bridge Road, Netherton Way and Southport Road.

Merseyrail services: A seven-and-a-half-minute service will run between Aintree and Liverpool Central/Moorfields stations at the following times:

• From approximately 11am to 2pm (before the races)
• From approximately 5pm to 8.48pm (after the races)

Anyone who is planning to travel between April 13 and 15 is advised to plan their journey in advance. The lines that will be affected are as follows:

• Ormskirk line – stations between Liverpool city centre and Ormskirk will have a normal 15-minute service. Aughton Park station and Town Green station will have a 30-minute service to allow for extra trains to operate. Trains to Liverpool will not call at Orrell Park station between 4.30pm to 9pm.
• Southport line – trains will run to a slightly amended 15-minute timetable.
• Kirkby line – some services from 10am to 9pm will start and terminate at Sandhills. You may have to change at Sandhills if you are a passenger for Moorfields or Liverpool Central, or if you are returning to Rice Lane, Fazakerley or Kirkby. Services operated by Northern from Kirkby to Wigan Wallgate will be a rail-replacement bus service. The last bus will leave Kirkby station at 7.20pm every evening.
• Wirral line - all stations will run to a normal timetable. If you are travelling to the festival from a Wirral line station, you are advised to change at Moorfields for an Aintree-bound train.

Buses and taxis: After racing finishes on both Friday and Saturday, buses and taxis will be operating from Park Lane into Liverpool City Centre.