17.08.15
Half of Virgin Train East Coast's fleet reliveried
Virgin Trains East Coast has hit the halfway mark on “the biggest rebranding exercise on the East Coast Main Line in a decade”.
Its new bright red livery has been applied to seven diesel HST sets and 16 electric sets of the 45 trains in its fleet. The whole fleet will be done by November, using 50,000 square metres of vinyl.
It has released this time-lapse video of one of the HSTs being wrapped at Craigentinny depot in Edinburgh over five days:
David Horne, managing director at Virgin Trains East Coast, said: “We’re thrilled to see the Virgin logo in its full glory adorning our HST trains. The work done by the team at our Edinburgh Craigentinny depot is fantastic. We’ve had some great feedback from our customers too.”
Livery designer Ray Stenning of Best Impressions said: “It’s great to be involved with such an exciting project to make the trains look much sexier and create a dynamic new look. Reaction to and feedback about the trains out and about on the route has been incredible.”
The TOC, which is 90% owned by Stagecoach and 10% by Virgin Group, has staggered the rebranding programme since it took over the franchise on 1 March 2015 to avoid disruption to services.
The fleet of InterCity 125s and 225s, hauled by diesel Class 43s and electric Class 91s, is to be replaced by December 2018 with the new Hitachi built Class 800 and 801 ‘Super Express’ trains under the Intercity Express Programme (IEP).
RTM recently visited the site of the new depot being built at Doncaster Carr, which will be the ‘centre of excellence’ for IEP maintenance on the East Coast Main Line. A report from that visit, and interviews with senior staff from Hitachi Rail Europe and its main contractor VolkerFitzpatrick, is in the August/September 2015 edition of RTM. Rail industry professionals can subscribe for free here.