JOURNEY times to Scotland have been slashed by an hour with the completion this weekend of the £9bn refit of the west coast mainline rail route.
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While the London-Scotland service shows the most obvious gain – down from 5hr 20mins to 4hr 10mins* – trip times all along the west side of England share in the benefit: the journey time between London and Birmingham, the country’s second city, fall from 1hr 43 mins to 1hr 12 mins, for instance.
“This has been an extraordinarily complex project to rebuild Europe’s busiest mixed-use railway,” said Iain Coucher, CEO of Network Rail, the body which ran the 11-year long project.
“Now it is complete passengers and freight operators will reap the benefits.”
Passengers have been warned that in the early days of the new track’s life, there might be teething trouble and, sure enough, today a blown fuse caused some early morning delays.
“During the first few months as the timetable beds in, passengers’ expectations may not always be fulfilled,” admitted Tony Collins, CEO of Virgin Rail.
“I believe however that within six months we shall have a railway of which the nation can truly be proud.”
* For the moment the London-Glasgow time will be 4hr 30mins, but will then drop to 4hr 10mins when a new service that only stops at Preston is introduced.
