More than 150,000 people are set to attend the three-day festival

Mark Dowd from Merseytravel has criticised the firm over the works, saying they should not take place during the Aintree race festival.

Network Rail said the works would not be cancelled and that the nearby stations and line would be unaffected.

More than 150,000 people are expected at the Aintree race festival next week.

Jo Kaye, Network Rail's area general manager, said the engineering works had been planned in January 2006 and train operators had been fully consulted.

She said the essential engineering work would only affect passengers travelling from the Newton-le-Willows and Earlestown area towards Liverpool, and the Wigan North Western line to Liverpool via St Helens Central.

Total disregard

Jo Kaye added: "As Merseytravel has already pointed out, all other lines in the area are open and being strengthened by train operators Northern and Merseyrail, and services from further afield are running normally.

"We have a multi-million pound programme of work which includes track renewal, signalling and structures work.

"This was planned as long ago as January last year and we consulted with Northern over the work."

Our pleas have fallen on deaf ears and the management of Network Rail are pressing on regardless Councillor Mark Dowd, chair of Merseytravel

The chair of Merseytravel, Councillor Mark Dowd, said it "shows a total disregard" for users of public transport.

Mr Dowd said: "To plan these works during one of the year's busiest days for our rail network shows a total disregard for the thousands of rail passengers who will now have to use replacement buses to get to the Grand National.

"We've asked Network Rail to revise the date or suspend the works on Grand National day but our pleas have fallen on deaf ears and the management of Network Rail are pressing on regardless."

Northern Rail is laying on extra train carriages from Preston to Ormskirk and increasing services from Wigan Wallgate to Kirkby.

Merseytravel is providing regular direct bus services from Kirkby Station to Aintree Racecourse while Merseyrail will be adding extra carriages and increasing the frequency of its services to and from the racecourse.