Coventry Telegraph

As Virgin leaves Coventry Railway Station to undergo huge change at end of year

- By ELIS SANDFORD News Reporter elis.sandford@reachplc.com

COVENTRY Railway Station is set to undergo a massive change at the end of the year as part of a nationwide shake up.

As of December 8, Virgin Trains will no longer be running services on the West Coast Main

Line, having lost the franchise.

It means the trains which currently depart Coventry for London Euston, Birmingham New Street, and Scotland will no longer be the familiar red and yellow Virgin branded Pendolinos and Voyager trains.

Instead, the services will be run by First Trenitalia.

New colours aside, the difference­s to services will be minimal, at least at first.

It will be the same trains on the tracks albeit with different livery - which is currently being kept under wraps.

In the meantime, the Virgin Trains branding is gradually being removed - with the process hoped to be finished by December 7, the final day of operation for Virgin Trains.

And while the nationwide timetable change takes place on December 15, it is not thought that there will be many, if any changes, impacting Coventry.

West Midlands Railways or CrossCount­ry services which operate out of Coventry and the surroundin­g local stations are yet to reveal if they are to make any changes to timetables in December, but after the large scale changes made in May , it is not thought that any drastic changes will be made.

Down the line, larger changes are likely from First Trenitalia, but it is thought that business will remain largely the same over the first few months of their management of the franchise.

The changes taking place on the railways are set to have an impact on a large section of the UK railways - but there is also set to be another change closer to home.

Virgin Trains currently operate Coventry Railway Station, and are therefore involved in the day-to-day running of the station.

But from December 8, this will no longer be the case either.

It is not known exactly what changes can and

will be made - but it is believed that staff will all transfer over to First Trenitalia. In the short term, there will be no changes to the station, aside from the change to branding. At this time, it is unclear if any significan­t changes will be made - given that the large scale railway masterplan is underway.

Coventry City Council’s £82 million project to transform the railway station comes as Coventry was recently said to be the fastest growing station outside of London.

The plans include a new footbridge and canopies, a multi-storey car park, bus interchang­e, and a second station building facing Warwick Road.

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