Rail passengers travelling from Norwich to London have been warned they will face disruption this summer because of a £7m track upgrade.

Network Rail is upgrading the tracks around Colchester station, which it says is necessary to make more reliable services for the growing number of passengers on the Great Eastern Main Line.

The improvements will take place at weekends from this Saturday through to July 6, but will mean passengers heading from Norwich to London will have to change trains at Colchester.

Richard Schofield, Network Rail's route managing director, said: 'We are investing millions of pounds to upgrade the tracks at Colchester station so that passengers across Anglia get more reliable and punctual trains.

'This is urgently required work and will deliver a much better level of service to the growing number of passengers that rely on rail services.

'We are sorry that some disruption will be caused over the weekends that we do this work and have worked closely with Abellio Greater Anglia to minimise the impact on the travelling public.

'We ask passengers to bear with the temporary disruption so that we can give them a better, more reliable service for the long term.'

Tanya Jacques, Abellio Greater Anglia Area customer service manager for Colchester, said: 'We have worked closely with our Network Rail colleagues in planning this important programme of improvement works at Colchester to avoid the need for any disruptive bus replacement services.

'By changing trains at Colchester instead, we can help to minimise the inconvenience for rail passengers, whilst ensuring the improvements which will deliver a more reliable service for our customers, are carried out efficiently.

'We will also be providing additional staff to assist customers changing from one service to another in doing all we can to ensure a seamless level of service whilst these works take place. Customers can obtain full details of the service alterations at our local stations and website.'

Passengers are advised to check how it will affect them at abelliogreateranglia.co.uk and nationalrail.co.uk