Virgin Trains is to increase its services from Glasgow and Birmingham to London with the start of its high frequency timetable in January 2009. Journey times will also be reduced, with the fastest from Birmingham taking 1h12m to reach the capital and that from Glasgow, just 4h10m.
Glasgow is to gain its earliest services to London yet, with three trains arriving before 11:26 ” the earliest time on the current network for arrival at London”s Euston station. The first of these is to leave the Scottish city at 04:30, arriving 09:08; the second at 05:40, expected in London 10:10; and the third leaving at 06:30, reaching London at 11:10. The first in the opposite direction leaves Euston an hour earlier at 05:50.
An additional four Virgin Pendolino trains in each direction will serve the route on weekdays and not only will services start earlier, but also run later, with the last to depart Glasgow at 19:40, an hour after the current service. The last to leave Euston for Glasgow will be 82 minutes later than at present, departing at 19:30.
”This is great news for Glasgow and will allow the train to really challenge the plane,” said Virgin Trains business development director, Tim Shoveller. The train also provides a city centre to city centre travel experience without the wasted time of airport transfers and check-in.”
The Birmingham-London route is to benefit from 17 additional trains per day, providing three per hour during the off-peak period and more at the start and end of the working day. Eight trains will arrive before 09:00 with the new timetable, three more than the current total. These trains will provide more than 6,500 extra seats on the route each weekday.
Commenting on the Birmingham route Shoveller added: ”This is the first time that a long distance inter-city service has operated at a frequency normally only seen on suburban rail networks. The improved journey time effectively turns London into a suburb of Birmingham.”
Virgin”s 2009 timetable also includes improvements and additional services on the Manchester-London and Chester-London routes, as part of its plan to provide an additional 13m seats a year across its West Coast network.