Should the GBR Livery be Neutral Colours?

[HSTEd]

Dark blue? That's a bold colour

Maybe with a red band to break it up?

Someone else yearns for a return to the GNER livery I see!

Personally I'd prefer just going to a dark colour all over, with an off-white on the doors for disability contrast.

What colour that is less important to me.

EDIT:

What about BTC Black and Silver?

 

[Bald Rick]

but I am proud to be a Yorkshireman and British, please stop hijacking my national flag.

Whcih nation, Yorkshire or the UK ?

 

[Elecman]

View attachment 211559

 

[S101]

Great idea, get the flags off of trains.

So, presumably youll be happy to see Pride flags gone then?

Meanwhile, we better stop naming trains. and remove all the existing names. After all, we've had trains named after castles, warships, military regiments, all nationalistic terms of war!
Some trains were named after sportspeople of course. Who represented their country. So we better get rid of those too. Nationalistic trash!

Which just leaves the few trains named after railway workers. Oh wait, all trade union members, so ties with left wing politics. Better get rid of those, so as not to be divisive.
Oh yes, theres a few named after railway bosses too. Evil capitalists! be gone!

Might have to get rid of a few station names as well. "Victoria" is very problematic!
Waterloo is just insulting to France.
Kings Cross? A reference to the evil monarchy? and to the cross! shocking!

Paddington? an illegal immigrant bear!
And if Kings Cross has to go, Mornington Crescent has to go too!

Where does it end?

^the best post this forum has seen for a long time^

Thanks.

 

[bramling]

The country seems to be becoming more divided by the day. Nationalism seems to be fuelling this.

Would a neutral colour scheme have been more suitable? No red, white and blue. Just something striking and recognisable? I'd have been happy with two tone, simple colours.

Red and gold? Green and Cream? One bold colour even.

Great British Railways didn't have to be those colours - particularly as it is essentially just England....

English Railways
Transport for England
Rail England

As an aside, I assume GBR will run services into Wales and Scotland?

I don’t have an issue with the colours featuring or even being a baseline - indeed if you take red white and blue out of the equation then it doesn’t leave much.

But what I don’t want is the flag being made to feature in a vulgar way.

Same with ScotRail’s livery, I don’t like it.

LU and NSE both managed to use the colours without turning it into some kind of political statement.

 

[Sun Chariot]

I posted this AI image of a chocolate & cream IET elsewhere on the forum before but i believe it would fit here too. Also doesn`t show the brake dust too much either. Candy Apple Red is a popular colour too!
View attachment 211554 View attachment 211556

Whilst not neutral in style neither can be classed as having any particular meaning to the public.

Belmond might have words about the first of those schemes.

I've gone for something totally new:
Base-colour discernable amongst rural / urban landscapes;
The wave is a nod to mainland UK surrounded by water;
The (light-reflective) electric-sparkle is a nod to electric and bi/tri mode power on much of the UK's railways in 2026.

 

[NCT]

An assured nation usually doesn't try to bring nationhood into people's everyday lives. I think significant uses of the flag outside of government businesses and diplomatic settings cheapens the flag.

There are good reasons for wanting certain industries and utilities to be nationalised. If nationalised industries all start to use flag-based colours and logos, then that nationalisation becomes nationalistic.

 

[43096]

Belmond might have words about the first of those schemes.

I've gone for something totally new:
Base-colour discernable amongst rural / urban landscapes;
The wave is a nod to mainland UK surrounded by water;
The (light-reflective) electric-sparkle is a nod to the electric and bi/tri mode power.

That's utterly hideous, to be frank. Way worse than what DfT have actually done.

 

[Davester50]

Better rename the National Health Service then. Bit too nationalistic.

 

[NCT]

Better rename the National Health Service then. Bit too nationalistic.

The NHS has a pretty neutral blue logo, and it's not a Union Jack blue.

 

[KHCT]

I honestly can't see why we can't just have liveries that represent they type of service offered onboard the train, rather than the geographical area it operates in. At the risk of looking backwards, the Intercity livery made it clear what standard of service you should expect onboard. We could then have a regional/express and commuter version. The GBR livery (whatever it's merits or otherwise) doesn't seem to do this, with the only difference being an operating unit name. For me, having completely different rail identities in Wales, Scotland and potentially devolved part of England just dilute the 'unified system' message. Just keep it neutral, functional and representative of the service provision.

 

[Davester50]

The NHS has a pretty neutral blue logo, and it's not a Union Jack blue.

I wasn't talking about the English NHS logo. The name is full on Nationalistic.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 13 Sep 2026 ==

I honestly can't see why we can't just have liveries that represent they type of service offered onboard the train, rather than the geographical area it operates in. At the risk of looking backwards, the Intercity livery made it clear what standard of service you should expect onboard. We could then have a regional/express and commuter version. The GBR livery (whatever it's merits or otherwise) doesn't seem to do this, with the only difference being an operating unit name. For me, having completely different rail identities in Wales, Scotland and potentially devolved part of England just dilute the 'unified system' message. Just keep it neutral, functional and representative of the service provision.

I liked the way SWT applied the Red units, Blue units and White units scheme. Would have been ideal for GBR.

 

[S101]

ooooof. Aldi and Morrisons could do with easing off on the flags in shops too. I was almost offended. How very dare they use the Union Flag to promote British Produce.

 

[Sun Chariot]

I liked the way SWT applied the Red units, Blue units and White units scheme. Would have been ideal for GBR.

I agree - for me, it was a cohesive "family of liveries" and yet each one had a clear remit.

 

[Sorcerer]

I liked the way SWT applied the Red units, Blue units and White units scheme. Would have been ideal for GBR.

Although I prefer a single livery applicable to most trains, I could've also gotten behind a South West Trains style colour scheme. I would've even kept the coding of red for local, blue for regional, and white for express services.

 

[AlterEgo]

IMHO, I think GBR was chosen when Starmer was scared to death of not seeming nationalistic.

How can that be? It was coined by the Williams-Shapps Plan of 2021 when Boris Johnson was PM and had been a working title for a few years prior.

 

[GusB]

I don't see the colours of the union flag as a problem. The issue for me is the way they've been applied; it's hideous! Red, white and blue could easily have been applied in a more tasteful manner. If a flag must be applied, it would be better incorporated in the logo than the livery.

 

[izvor]

The angles of the red and white are clumsy and don't "flow" when a train passes at speed.

This is my main objection to the GBR livery. And I've yet to see one pass at speed (or at all).

I don't care what colours they use as long as they are non-offensive, and personally approved by me.

 

[sabanda]

I quite like the current 'Carmillon' TGV livery, though it is getting to be a little dated. It bears a very passing resemblance to the Greater Anglia colour scheme, which I think would be more than suitable as a GBR livery.

 

[Bletchleyite]

I posted this AI image of a chocolate & cream IET elsewhere on the forum before but i believe it would fit here too. Also doesn`t show the brake dust too much either. Candy Apple Red is a popular colour too!
View attachment 211554 View attachment 211556

Whilst not neutral in style neither can be classed as having any particular meaning to the public.

Having GBR in that font just spoils it. I'm not quite sure why I think SBB CFF FFS in Helvetica looks good but that not, but it just doesn't. Maybe it's because their livery is more functional than decorative?

Just the double arrow would look loads better.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 14 Sep 2026 ==

This is my main objection to the GBR livery. And I've yet to see one pass at speed (or at all).

I don't care what colours they use as long as they are non-offensive, and personally approved by me.

I don't mind the red, white and blue any more than I minded it on Network SouthEast which looked good. I don't even mind the shapes - but they need to be on the end vehicle only pointing in the direction of travel, and the intermediates either be plain or have a different abstract pattern. The TPE livery should give you an idea.

Locomotives should be a single colour as they will always at some point end up the wrong way round. Perhaps "large logo" red, but with no GBR text.

 

[Sun Chariot]

This is my main objection to the GBR livery. And I've yet to see one pass at speed (or at all).

I don't care what colours they use as long as they are non-offensive, and personally approved by me.

The GBR 387 unit passed by me, at about 50mph, early July. The sudden changes in form and colours - the red sweeping upward but then suddenly "cut off" - as each coach passed, I really disliked.
Its visual jarring to my eyes, is akin to Pilkington liveried Mk1 carriages of 35 years ago; the effect as they passed, was just as irritating!

 

[TastyMaltesers]

I think red, white and blue is a perfectly acceptable combination of colours - but I find the execution as is to be very poor. My primary gripes are that it's too busy and has poor continuity along the length of a train.

 

[Bletchleyite]

I think red, white and blue is a perfectly acceptable combination of colours - but I find the execution as is to be very poor. My primary gripes are that it's too busy and has poor continuity along the length of a train.

The continuity thing is rarely done these days as the doors break it up anyway. However having the same directional arrow device on every coach just looks odd, and however much I look at it I can't get used to it. The TPE livery as I note above gives a good example of how this sort of thing should be done, with directional devices on the end vehicles and non-directional ones (mountain peaks, in essence) on the intermediates. Indeed just redoing that livery in GBR colours would in my view look great, but if not it should follow that concept.

 

[PartyOperator]

Could have just copied the LNER livery because it already exists and it looks fine and it's England flag coloured without having annoyed anyone so far.

 

[Mike Machin]

Most national state-owned passenger train operators use branding not connected with their nation’s flags. Norways’s flag is dark red, dark blue and white yet their trains are a metallic tasteful teal. The Netherlands flag is blue, white and red, yet the trains are predominantly yellow and a different blue. Germany is black, red and yellow, yet the trains are mainly bright red or red and white. And France eschewed nationalistic colours for SNCF and uses a plethora of brandings depending on the route, type of Tain etc, yet SNCF remains a strong brand.

As other posters have said, and indeed I have said in these forums months ago, a revised variation of Greater Anglia would have been very tasteful. Or, we could follow the French model and just leave everything as it is for now and just make greater use of the double arrow and GBR titles.

 

[Tetchytyke]

I find the livery objectionable but only because it looks like it was designed by a toddler off their face on Haribo, it is way too busy. The 68+MkIV set which has just been done out in it makes my teeth itch. It could only be worse if they used Comic Sans as the font.

Red, white, and blue works well on a train livery (photo from Wikimedia Commons):

 

[Bletchleyite]

Could have just copied the LNER livery because it already exists and it looks fine and it's England flag coloured without having annoyed anyone so far.

I do think that the LNER livery would be a good replacement InterCity one (replace the word LNER with the word INTERCITY with the same flash on the N), but they seem insistent on not bringing back the world's best known and most successful railway brand for some reason I don't at all understand.

 

[81A]

I do think that the LNER livery would be a good replacement InterCity one (replace the word LNER with the word INTERCITY with the same flash on the N), but they seem insistent on not bringing back the world's best known and most successful railway brand for some reason I don't at all understand.

I would argue that any "GBR intercity" livery should use the union flag (as intercity operators link three of the four nations), with the St. George's cross applied to regional trains (in England, in the same fashion the St. Andrew's cross is used by ScotRail).

 

[Sun Chariot]

I find the livery objectionable but only because it looks like it was designed by a toddler off their face on Haribo,

My coffee is now down the front of my jumper Best analogy of the year!

 

[Bletchleyite]

I would argue that any "GBR intercity" livery should use the union flag (as intercity operators link three of the four nations), with the St. George's cross applied to regional trains (in England, in the same fashion the St. Andrew's cross is used by ScotRail).

I have argued for "Rail England" before. The LNER livery could tastefully use Union Flag colours by adding a blue stripe under the red window band.