The 125 Group has announced that they have signed a deal with the East Lancashire Railway that will see a HST join the railway’s home fleet.
The HST vehicles will be based at the East Lancashire Railway and will make their debut at the line’s DMU Gala on the 8th and 9th November.
The 125 Group says that the new partnership provides an excellent base for celebrating the 50th anniversary of the InterCity 125 next year.
More details of public running dates and special events will be released in due course.
ELR Chairman Mike Kelly welcomed the new collaboration, commenting: “We’re absolutely thrilled and honoured to be working with the 125 Group to bring the InterCity 125 to the East Lancashire Railway. Each generation lives through their era of railway history and now a new generation can, through this unique partnership, enjoy seeing and riding behind the iconic InterCity 125
125 Group Trustee Alex Wood commented: “With a train as large and iconic as ours, working in collaboration with preservation partners is essential to ensure we can keep, maintain and operate both at preservation sites and with access to the mainline. Partnering with the ELR gives us the best of all worlds and will allow us to celebrate 50 years of HSTs in fine style. We are looking forward to staging a wide range of events to celebrate and demonstrate our historic railway masterpiece.
Responses
The question is how many carriages will it have in normal running use? I am betting on 4 or 5, the sad bit is however seeing a fast diesel that was designed to run at 125mph is now relegated to 25mph on a preserved branchline.
Better than it not running at all though.
I was in Scotland a few weeks ago and still quite a few HST sets in operation.
I went on the Midland Pullman to Inverness and the Kyle of Lochalsh – the HST coaches still provide a high quality of ride.
Very true, I have traveled on them on a number of times usually down to Cornwall and back and the ride was probably the best train for comfort that I have experienced.
The 125 Group HST will still be going out on the mainline for railtours, as it has been, doing 125mph where permitted. Its one of the multitude of reasons ELR was chosen due to its mainline connection.
It would get very costly, very quickly to have to transport a complete HST rake by road and choosing a preserved railway line that has a direct connection with the mainline does make the whole HST rake far easier to go on it’s travels.
I did hear that a number of ‘celebrity’ locomotives are now banned from being moved by road and they are only now allowed to visit preserved railways’ that have a direct connection with Network Rail lines, as the insurance costs have gone up dramatically over the last few years.
The East Lancashire actually has two connections to the outside world as it has the link going from Heywood Station up to Castleton, along with a direct connection to the Manchester Metrolink Light Rail System at the southern end of the Bury Bolton Street Station. Maybe one day a Metrolink Light Rail System vehicle may visit there, as that naughty blue engine Thomas once managed to reach the Metrolink depot under it’s own steam.
For the record the Metrolink System is not a tram system but a light rail system, the first line from Manchester Victoria to Bury ran on the preexisting heavy rail and was gauged to British Rail standards so it could use the existing stations and track formations.
The first T68 Light Rail System vehicles were considered to be to train like when they first started to street run to Eccles and had to have extra skirting added carefully so as to be ‘road legal’ and also British Rail gauge compatible, which the new units are also.
The only thing stopping the running of Metrolink Light Rail System vehicles to Stockport is a new connection to Network Rail lines and also a suitable power source as the existing overhead power lines are the wrong voltage, they would have no issues as far as gauging goes.