The famous London North East Railway Flying Scotsman services between Edinburgh Waverley and London King’s Cross have returned to their historic mid-morning departure slots following major timetable changes on the East Coast Main Line.
The reinstated timings follow the introduction of a new industry-wide timetable in December 2025, bringing 10,000 additional London North Eastern Railway services each year and 60,000 extra seats every week.
The revised schedule also introduced an hourly fast service between the two capitals, reducing journey times to around four hours and ten minutes using the LNER Azuma fleet.
To mark the occasion on Monday, 18 May 2026, musicians from the Celtic rock band The Red Hot Chilli Pipers performed at both stations ahead of the 10:00 am southbound departure from Edinburgh and the 10:30 am northbound service from London King’s Cross.
Scottish dancers entertained passengers on the concourses, while pipers joined London North East Railway staff in welcoming customers boarding the trains.
First introduced in 1862 and officially named in 1924, the service became renowned for simultaneous 10:00 departures from both capitals. Although the Flying Scotsman name remained in use through recent years, the southbound service had departed Edinburgh before 06:00 am, with no equivalent northbound working.
Passengers on the inaugural restored services were served a Scottish-themed First Class menu featuring haggis pie, cranachan, shortbread, and tablet.
“We know how popular named services are and the Flying Scotsman is one of the most well known in railway history, synonymous with speed and quality. We are proud to offer our customers a modern-day service that combines that history with the comfort and convenience of our Azuma trains.
“We’re delighted to be able to restore the services to the historic mid-morning timings as part of our timetable transformation, which continues to provide many thousands more seats per week across our route, and even more great value fares.”
Colette Casey, Customer Experience Director at LNER.
Responses
Just a shame they could not invent a headboard or self adhesive sticker for the front of the train to publicise the service. Otherwise to the ordinary person it just looks like any other regular Azuma service.
Sorry to say the total lack of advance publicity let this iconic service down. Reporting it the next day is nothing short of being rude to the public. If I had been aware I would have booked a ticket from London returning later that day.. Now is too late. Come on L.N.E.R. as the absolute premier U.K. line get it together quickly. At least both directions were close to “on Time”
This is how Nationisation works. No clues on how to do publicity.