Cross Country services
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Cross Country services on the UK Rail Network are those which, by definition, carry passengers on routes other than the main lines radiating from the principal hubs. In most instances they avoid London termini, being directly routed between other large centres of population.
[edit] History
Such routes have always been necessary, particularly since many of the main lines have started or finished in London, and transfers between termini there have always meant delays in a journey. Both before the 1923 Grouping and in today's fractured rail system this has meant cooperation between the operating companies when the services cross from one company's operating area to another.
An early example of this was the Aberdeen to Penzance Through Service [a distance of 785 miles (1256km)] which was inaugurated on 3 October 1921, and which ran over the metals of seven different railway companies. The service was maintained by adding or removing the through coaches from trains already running on the routes: one coach of North British Railway stock, was added to an Aberdeen-London express, and was detached from it at York, where the train was made up with the addition of more coaches and sleeping cars to complete the journey.
During the 1930s, when competition from the roads became fierce and when many more people were travelling to coastal resorts, trains were being operated from the North of England to the South Coast, and from and through the Midlands to other resorts on the east and west coasts. Trains usually consisted of rakes of coaches from one of the "Big Four" and were then hauled by locomotives which were sometimes changed when crossing from one company to another.
[edit] Today's services
The following cross country services operate today; some franchises, for example CrossCountry who operate the first three of those services listed and (unlike those described above) operate the entire service :
- South West - Birmingham - the North West. Service operates from Penzance via Birmingham and the West Coast Main Line to Glasgow:
- South Coast - Birmingham - Northern England and Scotland. Service operates from Brighton and Bournemouth via Reading railway station and Birmingham to Manchester, Newcastle and Edinburgh CrossCountry Service XC3
- South West - Birmingham - the North East and Scotland. Service operates from Penzance or Cardiff Central via Birmingham, Sheffield, Leeds, Newcastle upon Tyne and Edinburgh to Aberdeen. CrossCountry service XC1. (see Cross Country Route (MR)).
- TransPennine Express routes. TransPennine Express is a train operating company operating services across the north of England. There are three service routes, centred on Manchester. One service links Newcastle and Liverpool via Manchester; the other two from Manchester to Lincolnshire via Sheffield and Hull and from Manchester to the Lake District, Edinburgh and Glasgow.
- Virgin Trains routes. Virgin Trains operate the service between Birmingham and Edinburgh or Glasgow as part of the West Coast franchise, which is mainly routes from London to North West England and Scotland.
- West Coastway and East Coastway lines. These two lines form a continuous link between Southampton via Brighton to Hastings and Ashford
- Arriva Trains Wales
- West Wales - Cardiff Central - Manchester via Newport amd Hereford
- Cardiff Central - Holyhead via Shrewsbury and Wrexham General
- Heart of Wales Line links Shrewsbury with Swansea in South Wales
