BORDER CROSSING

After years of playing catch-up, rail is fast becoming an excellent alternative to flying between London and Glasgow or Edinburgh

After decades of declining passenger numbers, Anglo-Scottish rail has finally turned the corner. The “high road” of air travel – for years considered the better choice, and the main option for people travel between London and Edinburgh or Glasgow – is losing market share.

Having travelled the East Coast main line (ECML) route for many decades, I can confirm the British Railways era (pre-1965) was the low point for Anglo-Scottish rail.

That BR era was one of managed decline; and indeed, the 1960s’ Beeching report even recommended the ECML be severed north of Newcastle, with all Edinburgh-bound traffic routed via the West Coast main line (WCML).

Today, of course, it’s quite different. Compared to the 1960s, the ECML – managed by Network Rail, which is government owned but has private train operating companies (TOCs) running on it – has staged a renaissance. It easily outperforms the WCML in terms of passenger numbers.

In fact with fast trains every 30 minutes, the ECML offers almost the sort of service frequency one would expect on some suburban lines.

In contrast, the WCML only operates hourly services. Not as frequent as those over on the ECML, but a significant improvement on what would have been expected in the past.

Figures released last summer gave rail a 33 per cent market share of the air/rail journey between London and Edinburgh/Glasgow, beating the previous record of 32 per cent set in June 2014. Virgin Train East Coast’s

( VTEC) Edinburgh-London route is the star performer, with Virgin Trains ( VT) Glasgow-London not too far behind.

“When we took over the ECML route we set an ambitious plan to gain a 50 per cent market share between Edinburgh and London by 2023,” says David Horne, MD of VTEC.

“These figures show an encouraging start to that journey and confirm an historic shift in travel patterns towards train travel. Our customers have responded positively to the improvements in customer service, and investment in new train interiors and additional services.”

I would be failing in my duty as a journalist to not mention the service disruption that occurs from time to time. Trains can be delayed for, at best, a matter of minutes; at worst, several hours.