This coming Sunday, May 17th, a nationwide timetable change comes into effect.
London Northwestern Railway are using this timetable change to introduce an extra 42,000 seats on its services into and out of London Euston per week.
This weekend marks the end of LNR’s rollout of the brand-new Class 730/2 Aventra fleet onto routes between London and Milton Keynes, and on the Trent Valley Line connecting the capital with destinations in Staffordshire, Warwickshire and Buckinghamshire.
These state-of-the-art trains boost capacity by 5,700 seats per day compared to the trains they replace, Class 350 desiro trains.
The displaced trains will be used to lengthen services between London Euston and Birmingham, connecting the country’s capital with its second-largest city and bringing an extra 14,000 seats per week to this important rail corridor.
LNR is celebrating this important milestone by offering its customers 50% off fares to London when booked in advance for travel in June 2026, with discount codes available from 17th May.
Other changes LNWR are introducing this coming Sunday include a new weekday direct service between Walsall and London Euston, leaving Walsall at 05:46 and returning from London Euston at 18:26. In addition, they are to introduce two additional services on Saturday evenings between Birmingham New Street and Liverpool Lime Street. LNR is requesting that passengers check their journeys carefully in case of any further changes on their website.
“The extra seats we are introducing to the West Coast Main Line are set to significantly improve the customer experience for our passengers, whether they use the route for their daily commute or travelling for leisure.
Completing the rollout of our new electric fleet is a milestone moment for us, representing our £1billion investment coming to fruition and truly making a difference for the millions of customers who travel with us to and from Euston each year. We’re celebrating by offering thousands of half-price tickets to our passengers, so they can try out our enhanced services for less this June.”
Jonny Wiseman, Customer Experience Director at London Northwestern Railway
Responses
The Class 730/2s can handle more extra passengers on the West Coast Main Line especially when operating from London Euston to Northampton, Tring, Milton Keynes Central, Birmingham New Street, Birmingham International, Wolverhampton, Stoke-on-Trent, Liverpool Lime Street, Stafford and Nuneaton.
Remember this is the train operator prior to coming under state control who abolished all 1st class.
Now it seems state railways are stuck with that misguided action of the former franchise holder Transport UK .
Such remarkable new trains that at least eight passengers do not even have a window to look out. Can we not design trains with windows for every bank of seats nowadays?