Lumo's new Stirling-London carriage interiors unveiled - with similar trains expected soon for ScotRail
Refurbished trains due to start running via the west coast main line by May
Cut-price train operator Lumo has revealed the interiors of the trains for its new Stirling-London service - which are of the same type which ScotRail is expected to use on its inter-city routes.
Lumo’s refurbished diesel class 222 trains are anticipated to start operating the cross-Border route via the west coast main line through Carlisle and Preston by May.
Meantime, ministers are expected to announce shortly that Scottish Government-owned ScotRail will also run refurbished class 222 trains on its Edinburgh and Glasgow to Aberdeen and Inverness routes to replace its ageing diesel Inter7City “High Speed Trains” (HSTs), which are approaching 50 years old.
Although the decor of Lumo’s single-class carriage interiors is likely to differ from ScotRail’s, the images published on Thursday give its passengers a broad impression of what could lie in store for them.
An industry source said: “I would expect the interiors to be similar to Lumo’s.”
Transport Scotland told The Scotsman last month that the second-hand fleet was expected to start entering service in the middle of next year following refurbishment, with all the trains running by mid 2028.
The Scottish Government agency is expected to agree a contract by next month.
Lumo said its five trains, previously used by East Midlands Railway since 2004, would feature a combination of refurbished and new seats with “sleek silver and grey tones”.
The operator - part of Aberdeen-based FirstGroup - already runs a limited stop Glasgow-Edinburgh-London service via the east coast main line through Newcastle.
The four daily return services between Stirling and London Euston will call at Larbert, Greenfaulds (near Cumbernauld), Whifflet (near Coatbridge), Motherwell, Lockerbie, Carlisle, Preston, Crewe, Nuneaton and Milton Keynes.
That will give Whifflet and Greenfaulds their first direct rail link to London, and restore Larbert’s after a gap of 60 years.
The service was originally planned by new operator Grand Union, which had hoped to launch four trains a day on the route last year. FirstGroup bought Grand Union in 2024.
A fifth daily service will operate between Preston and London.
Lumo is an "open access" operator which does not receive government funding, unlike east coast rivals LNER, which runs far more trains which also stop at many more stations.
The new Stirling service will see it compete for passengers on the English section of the west coast line with operators including sister firm Avanti West Coast, which is also owned by FirstGroup.
Open access operators are concerned about their long-term future under the Labour UK Government, which is nationalising English train firms, but the Conservatives said such operators should be "championed".
Transport Scotland said ScotRail’s replacement inter-city trains would be “fully compliant with modern crashworthiness requirements” unlike the HSTs, one of which was involved in the fatal derailment at Carmont near Stonehaven in 2020.
It said the older trains were being withdrawn on “commercial” grounds - understood to be their high operating costs.
The agency said their withdrawal on health and safety grounds was “not justifiable” as any benefits “would be significantly outweighed by the costs of implementation”, so it would be “grossly disproportionate”.
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