Clifton railway bridge near Penrith has been replaced by Network Rail and Skanska as part of a £60m investment in the West Coast Main Line.

The new 130-metre-long structure was carefully manoeuvred into place with millimetre precision on Saturday.

Time-lapse footage shows how the new pre-built bridge – which has been waiting in the wings after the old structure was demolished last weekend – was driven into place by specialist machines with more than 600 wheels.

To allow the huge civil engineering project to take place, two unprecedented 60-hour closures of the whole motorway were scheduled between junctions 39 and 40 over consecutive weekends.

Despite sub-zero temperatures and bad weather, work went so well that the motorway reopened shortly before 4pm on Sunday 11 January – 13 hours ahead of schedule – allowing the National Highways diversionary routes to be lifted much earlier than planned.

Christian Irwin, Network Rail North West and Central region Capital Delivery director, said: “It’s a testament to the hard work of hundreds of people that we’ve been able to install this huge new structure both successfully and speedily.”

“Our focus now turns to final bridge checks before we reinstate the tracks, overhead power lines and signalling systems so we can fully reopen the West Coast Main Line by 5am on Thursday.”

Rosario Barcena, Skanska UK rail programme director, said: “Over the course of the weekend, we’ve worked closely with Network Rail and National Highways to re-prioritise our work in order that we could re-open the motorway much earlier than planned.

“It’s been achieved thanks to our whole team, including our amazing supply chain partners. They’ve worked tirelessly across the weekend to successfully install the new Clifton railway bridge, a hugely complex and precise operation, and now re-open the motorway.”