Harringay, Haringey - So Good they Spelt it Twice!

A Virgin Flying Scotsman

My kitchen looks out across the railway just this side of Finsbury Park station so I get to see all the trains that go past.

Lately I've noticed a Virgin engine with a name... Flying Scotsman.

It's the only one in the fleet of Virgin trains with a name and a famous one at that. What's the story behind it I wonder? Surely there can be only one Flying Scotsman.

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Permalink Reply by matt on March 30, 2016 at 21:19

I think the bearded one put some £s in the pot for the actual Flying Scotman refurb but of course he'll advertise the fact!

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Permalink Reply by michaelw on March 30, 2016 at 21:38

I'm pretty sure that GNER had a locomotive called Flying Scotsman when they ran the route - it may even go back to pre-privatisation. I used to travel a lot on the East Coast route, but not so much in recent years.

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Permalink Reply by Gordon T on March 31, 2016 at 7:49

It follows a precedent set in 1924, where a particular train service and the locomotive (that may be) used to haul it are both named 'Flying Scotsman'.

In more detail, the electric locomotive has been running in that all-over vinyl Virgin livery with 'Flying Scotsman' name (and nameplate) for a few months now, and previously had a different 'Flying Scotsman' all-over purple livery from the previous franchise operator. That was done in 2011 to relaunch the 'Flying Scotsman' as a named train service, specifically one train a day that ran (and still runs) non-stop Edinbugh to Kings Cross in exactly four hours, the fastest such service by some way.

That was also in essence the situation in 1924, when the newly formed London & North Eastern Railway branded as 'The Flying Scotsman' the principal daily service between London and Edinburgh, and further publicised it by naming one of their new express locomotives 'Flying Scotsman' and getting much extra publicity by putting the locomotive on show at the British Empire Exhibition at Wembley. Four years later the service became non-stop with the use of 'corridor tenders' to allow a second engine crew to take over on the fly, further shortening the journey time and increasing its appeal to passengers.

At the recent run for the steam 'Flying Scotsman', the Virgin locomotive was positioned alongside its steam ancestor at Kings Cross, and hauled a London-Edinburgh train which overtook the steam service along the route, giving Richard Branson a handy 'but our train's faster' bit of publicity.