RAIL passengers face more misery after Virgin trains revealed it is unable to take bookings for the New Year.

And Network Rail has admitted it will be at least seven days before they can tell Virgin their planned programme of repairs on the West Coast Line.

It means passengers wanting to travel from Liverpool to London on most dates in 2004 will have to wait a week before they can buy their tickets.

Virgin has told staff not to take any more bookings unless it is for people wanting to travel on that day.

More than 100 separate pieces of work have been ordered over Christmas, as well as bridge and points repairs, and large parts of the West Coast main line may be closed until New Year's Day.

The improvements on the UK's busiest main line were expected to cost £2.5bn but that figure is now likely to reach £8.5bn.

New tilting trains will run at 125mph rather than 140mph. Ordinary British trains have been able to run at 125mph since 1975.

A spokeswoman for Network Rail said the delay in booking tickets should be fixed in a week.

She added: "The situation should be resolved in a week with customers being able to book tickets for January. Our timetable staff have been working on organising the maintenance work."

A spokesman for Virgin Trains said: "This affects people who are booking on the internet or over the phone.

"It affects the days when rail repair is planned to go ahead, particularly holidays and the weekend.

"We are still waiting to hear when we are going to be able to run trains in January.

"This only affects buying tickets in advance. Members of the public going to buy tickets to travel that day do not need to worry."

Track renewals and signalling works will take place during the two-day closure of the network on Christmas Day and Boxing Day. Buses will be in operation on the affected routes, which include the West Coast Main Line between Stockport and Manchester.

The West Coast Main Line section between Stafford and Crewe is presently closed and will remain so until January 1.

Last week, Network Rail was given £22bn of government money to modernise the railways over the next five years. But funds for the West Coast line, crucial to Merseyside, were cut by £640m.

Rail regulator Tom Winsor said the money allocated would still enable improvements in 2004/5 to be made which would cut journey time to London from Liverpool by at least an hour.