Taking the longest train

Welcome

Working as a railway journalist involves attending all kinds of events. But it was perhaps one of my more eccentric decisions to volunteer to take part in a Rail Delivery Group event marking the longest day of the year on 21 June.

This involved doing the full 774-mile journey on CrossCountry’s 08.20 Aberdeen to Penzance service, the longest through journey possible on the network. The irony, of course, was that CrossCountry had originally proposed changing this service when it recast its timetable, but it survived largely due to protests from the Scottish Government about cutting a key morning southbound service from Aberdeen.

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