The number of rail passengers using train stations in York remained below the pre-pandemic levels this year, new figures show.

Data published by the Office of Rail and Road (ORR) show that train station usage more than doubled across Britain in 2021-22, with 1.8 billion passenger trips compared to 690 million the year before, as commuters returned to their usual routines following the Covid 19 travel restrictions.

However, the figure is still below the three billion passengers who passed through Britain's stations in 2019-20.

The ORR figures show that 8.1 million passengers used York's train stations in 2021-22, up from 1.9 million the year before, but below the pre-pandemic levels of 10.2 million in 2019-20, with York station seeing more visitors than Poppleton.

ORR director, Feras Alshaker, said: "It is heartening to see passengers return to travelling by rail following what was a difficult period for the industry during the pandemic.

"There’s still some way to go in order for station usage figures to return to pre-pandemic levels.

"Once again it is important to thank all those in the rail industry, who continue to work hard to help people travel safely and with confidence."

LNER was the train operator that saw the highest increase of passengers this year, out of all the operators that run services through York, up 105 per cent on 2019-20 figures.

David Horne, managing director at LNER said: "We are delighted to be welcoming more and more people back to rail and we continue to work hard to attract even more people to travel with us by transforming the rail experience.

“We’ve added new destinations to our route, including our direct services between Middlesbrough and London King’s Cross which are celebrating their first anniversary.

"Our award-winning app makes it simpler and smarter for customers to find best value fares, reserve their seats and sign up for live journey updates and rewards by joining our popular LNER Perks loyalty scheme.”

Hull Trains also saw an increase of more than 100 per cent (102 per cent) compared to 2019, while Northern Trains saw an increase of 73.1 per cent, CrossCountry of 68.2 per cent, and Transpennine Express of 63.8 per cent of 2019-20 levels.

ORR says that the rail strikes which began in the summer, led by transport unions RMT and ALEF, had an impact on the number of passengers this year due to reduction in services and advice to only travel if necessary.

Major weather events, such as the extreme heatwave in the summer, also led to a reduction of services.