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This article is about the railway passenger service known as the "Flying Scotsman".
For the LNER locomotive of the same name, see: LNER Class A3 4472 Flying Scotsman. The The LNER Class A3 Pacific locomotive no 4472 "Flying Scotsman" (originally no
British Railways Poster celebrating the centenary of the Flying Scotsman. The locomotives shown are a GNR Stirling Single and a Class 55 'Deltic'.
British Railways Poster celebrating the centenary of the Flying Scotsman. See also Rail transport in Great Britain, National Rail, Network Rail This article is about the defunct entity "British Railways" The locomotives shown are a GNR Stirling Single and a Class 55 'Deltic'.

The Flying Scotsman is an express passenger train service that has been running between London, England and Edinburgh, Scotland since 1862. The Great Northern Railway (GNR was a British railway company established by the London & York Railway Act of 1846 Patrick Stirling ( 29 June 1820 - 11 November 1895) was Chief Mechanical Engineer of the Great Northern Railway. The Great Northern Railway (GNR G class Stirling Single is a class of steam locomotive designed for express passenger work The British Rail Class 55 is a class of Diesel locomotive built between 1961 and 1962 by English Electric. An express passenger train is fast Passenger train usually providing a service between major cities London ( ˈlʌndən is the capital and largest urban area in the United Kingdom. England is a Country which is part of the United Kingdom. Its inhabitants account for more than 83% of the total UK population whilst its mainland Edinburgh ( ˈɛdɪnb(ərə Dùn Èideann) is the Capital of Scotland and is its second largest city after Glasgow. Scotland ( Gaelic: Alba) is a Country in northwest Europethat occupies the northern third of the island of Great Britain. It is currently operated by National Express East Coast. National Express East Coast is the name under which the Train operating company NXEC Trains Ltd operates the InterCity East Coast rail franchise which

Contents

History

The East Coast Main Line over which the Flying Scotsman runs was built in the 19th century by many small railway companies, but mergers and acquisitions led to only three companies controlling the route; the North British Railway, the North Eastern Railway and the Great Northern Railway. The East Coast Main Line ( ECML) is the electrified high-speed railway link between London and Edinburgh connecting Yorkshire, North East The North British Railway was a Scottish railway company that was absorbed into the London and North Eastern Railway at the Grouping in 1923 The North Eastern Railway (NER unlike many other of the pre-Grouping companies had a relatively compact territory having the district it covered to itself The Great Northern Railway (GNR was a British railway company established by the London & York Railway Act of 1846 In 1860 the three companies established the East Coast Joint Stock for through services using common vehicles, and it is from this agreement that the Flying Scotsman came about.

East Coast Joint Stock

The first Special Scotch Express ran in 1862, with simultaneous 10am departures from the GNR's King's Cross Station in London and North British's Waverley Station in Edinburgh. King's Cross station is a major railway terminus opened in 1852 Edinburgh Waverley railway station, commonly referred to as just " Waverley " locally is the main Railway station in the Scottish capital The original journey took 10½ hours, including a half-hour stop at York for lunch; however, increasing competition and improvements in railway technology saw this time reduced to 8½ hours by the time of the Race to the North in 1888. York ( is an historic Walled city sited at the confluence of the rivers Ouse and Foss in North Yorkshire, England. The Race to the North is the name given to two summers in the late 19th century when British passenger trains belonging to different companies would literally race each other from

From 1900, the train was dramatically modernised, introducing such features as corridors between carriages, heating, and dining cars. As passengers could now lunch on the train, the York stop was reduced to 15 minutes, but the overall journey time remained 8½ hours.

London and North Eastern Railway

In 1923, the railways of Britain were 'grouped' into the so-called 'Big Four'. The Railways Act of 1921, also known as the Grouping Act, was an enactment by the British government of David Lloyd George intended to stem the losses being Consequently, all three members of the East Coast Joint Stock became part of the newly formed London and North Eastern Railway. The

It was the London and North Eastern which, in 1924, officially renamed the 10 AM Special Scotch Express linking Edinburgh and London in both directions as the Flying Scotsman, a name under which it had been unofficially known since the 1870s. To further publicise the train, a recently-built Gresley A1 Class locomotive was named after the train, and put on display at the 1924 British Empire Exhibition. Sir Herbert Nigel Gresley ( 19 June, 1876 &ndash 5 April, 1941) was one of Britain's most famous Steam locomotive engineers Disambiguation LNER Thompson Class A1/1, LNER Peppercorn Class A1 The London and North Eastern Railway LNER The LNER Class A3 Pacific locomotive no 4472 "Flying Scotsman" (originally no The British Empire Exhibition was a Colonial exhibition held at Wembley, Middlesex in 1924 and 1925 Due to a long-standing agreement between the competing West and East coast routes since the famous railway races of 1888 and 1895, speeds of the Scotch expresses were limited, the time for the 392 miles (631 km) between the capitals being a pedestrian 8h-15m. The Race to the North is the name given to two summers in the late 19th century when British passenger trains belonging to different companies would literally race each other from However following valve gear modifications, the A1 locomotive's coal consumption was drastically reduced and it was thus found possible to run the service non-stop with a heavy train on one tender full of coal. Five special tenders were built with a coal capacity of 9 tons instead of the usual 8; means were also given to access the locomotive from the train through a narrow tunnel inside the tender tank plus a flexible bellows connection linking it with the leading coach. This avoided engine crew fatigue by enabling a replacement driver and fireman to take over halfway without stopping the train. A1 locomotive number 4472, "Flying Scotsman" was used to haul the inaugural train from London on 1 May 1928, and it successfully ran the 392 miles between Edinburgh and London without stopping, a record at the time for a scheduled service (although the London Midland and Scottish Railway had four days earlier staged a one-off publicity coup by running the "Royal Scot's" Edinburgh section non-stop from Euston - 399. Events 305 - Diocletian and Maximian retire from the office of Roman Emperor. Year 1928 ( MCMXXVIII) was a Leap year starting on Sunday (link will display full calendar of the Gregorian calendar. London Midland for the new (2007 railway company The London Midland and Scottish Railway ( LMS) was a British Railway company The Royal Scot was a named passenger train that ran between London Euston and Glasgow, the length of the WCML, with previously 7 miles). The 1928 non-stop Flying Scotsman had improved catering and other on-board services - even a barber's shop [1] . With the end of the limited speed agreement in 1932, journey time was down to 7 h 30m and 7h 20m by 1938. The Flying Scotsman would remain a non-stop service right through past nationalisation (with the exception of the Second World War) until the early 1960s when the Deltic diesel locomotives took over. The British Rail Class 55 is a class of Diesel locomotive built between 1961 and 1962 by English Electric.

British Railways

In the late 1950s British Railways were committed to dieselisation, and began devising a replacement for the Gresley Pacifics on the East Coast Main Line. See also Rail transport in Great Britain, National Rail, Network Rail This article is about the defunct entity "British Railways" Dieselisation or Dieselization (see spelling differences) is generally used for the nowadays increasingly common use of Diesel fuel in vehicles as The result was the Class 55 'Deltic', and the Deltic-hauled Flying Scotsman became a centrepiece of British Railways advertising, as it had been for the LNER. The British Rail Class 55 is a class of Diesel locomotive built between 1961 and 1962 by English Electric.

After privatisation

The Flying Scotsman name has been maintained by the private operators of Anglo-Scottish trains on the East Coast Main Line; the former Great North Eastern Railway even subtitled itself The Route of the Flying Scotsman. Great North Eastern Railway ( GNER) was a British train operating company, owned by Sea Containers Ltd. Now operated by National Express East Coast, the northbound service departs from London King's Cross at the traditional time of 10. National Express East Coast is the name under which the Train operating company NXEC Trains Ltd operates the InterCity East Coast rail franchise which 00, while the southbound service leaves Edinburgh daily at 13. 00 (having originated from Glasgow Central at 11. Glasgow Central is the larger of the two present main-line Railway terminals in Glasgow, Scotland, and is managed by Network Rail. 50 on Mondays through Saturdays).

The present-day Flying Scotsman is usually operated by an InterCity 225 ‘Mallard’ set, and the journey takes around 4½ hours. The InterCity 225 is the fastest locomotive-hauled domestic train in the United Kingdom, comprising a Class 91 Electric locomotive, and nine

Locomotives

As a major link between the capital cities of England and Scotland, the Flying Scotsman was an extremely long and heavy train, especially in the days before road and air transport became common. As such, it has required very powerful locomotives. Locomotives used to haul (and in some cases, specifically designed to haul) the Flying Scotsman have included:

References

  1. ^ Brown F. A. S : "NIGEL GRESLEY, Locomotive engineer", (Ian Allan, London 1961 pp. 85,86, 120

External links

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