December 2025 East Coast Timetable

[mangyiscute]

I have to agree that all Kings Cross-Leeds services really should be full length trains with the maximum possible numbers of seats.

But where are you getting those trains from? I think everyone agrees that the current 2tph for Edinburgh, Newcastle and York (plus in between stations) to London is insufficient capacity so that also needs a third train per hour.

 

[158756]

They would be xx59 at Birtley Jn, not headway with the Lumo from London. They would also not have access to platform 2 any more at Newcastle if the TPE to Edinburgh is running.

And Lumo can't be slowed down because the other LNER train is right behind them - it looks like the fast LNER train actually has 3 minutes allowance to wait for Lumo to clear the platform at Newcastle.

I can't help thinking they're trying to do too much with the fast Edinburghs, and the timetable in general really. In the hours Lumo runs the three KGX-EDB trains end up running within 10 minutes north of Newcastle, so obviously any delay to the first is going to delay all of them.

If the slower Edinburgh can't have more stops, it'd probably make more sense for it to stop at Durham than Newark, but the timetable is so constrained it's difficult to move the Newark stop anywhere else, and in the hours Hull Trains runs in the xx00 path from KGX the Edinburgh is already catching it before Doncaster, so cutting the Newark stop would be pointless anyway.

On the subject of open access, IMO it feels like the timetable would be easier to arrange if the OA operators could be told which intermediate stops to serve to fit the new timetable. The odd stopping patterns designed for previous timetables and revenue abstraction metrics do seem like the tail wagging the dog a bit.

 

[InOban]

Northallerton isn't in the Top 100 flows from Edinburgh so thats less than 15k journeys per year; Morpeth is 61st but is quite adequately served with only 2 fewer LNER calls from December but a improved TPE (increased to 8 trains and all extend to Newcastle now, so that's 3 more at Morpeth) service and XC.

When did Northallerton first have through trains to Edinburgh? Not a traditional stop on these.

 

[43 302]

This Jacobs report is disputed by open access operators. There are conflicting claims about the extent to which open access train operators extract revenue from Government controlled train operators. The reality is that it is impossible to say for certain how much revenue is extracted, all numbers will be estimates making various assumptions as it is impossible to determine real revenues in the alternative scenario in which the open access services do not run.

Stop the press, company accused of doing a bad thing issues a statement to say that they did not do the bad thing.

 

[weeklycommuter]

But where are you getting those trains from? I think everyone agrees that the current 2tph for Edinburgh, Newcastle and York (plus in between stations) to London is insufficient capacity so that also needs a third train per hour.

That is the key issue with adding more LNER services in the December 2025 ECML timetable. To get the full benefit the additional services need to be run with full length trains. Adding more services without providing more rolling stock does not add any more capacity. The ten 10-car Class 897 trains will help but I do not know when they will come into service.

 

[Siemens Trains]

Is Durham not somewhere you're familiar with?

It's one of the busiest stations in the North East of England...

Funnily enough other than my local journeys around Edinburgh, the trip between Durham and Edinburgh is probably the one I make most frequently. Durham station certainly feels moderately busy although many passengers seem to be making short hops.

Admittedly the LNER trains we normally use from Edinburgh at about 8am and back from Durham at about 4.25pm will both disappear. However if Cross Country trains can be lengthened (and nasal clothes pegs issued to counter the aroma of poo from the toilets) these should be tolerable alternatives. Changing at Newcastle is often an option too. As we need to take a taxi south from Durham anyway, there's also the possibility of using the train to Darlington then catching a taxi north to our destination instead.

So personally it's an inconvenience but hardly the end of the world.

Looking at the bigger picture I can understand why Durham doesn't merit the status of Newcastle or Darlington on LNER, as it's so close to both stations and hardly an interchange.

 

[Clarence Yard]

On the subject of open access, IMO it feels like the timetable would be easier to arrange if the OA operators could be told which intermediate stops to serve to fit the new timetable. The odd stopping patterns designed for previous timetables and revenue abstraction metrics do seem like the tail wagging the dog a bit.

In which case you would probably do away with OA. OA. Operations are designed around specific business plans stopping at specific stations. Alter them and you start to affect their viability so unless they get Part J compensation for it, they won’t agree.

Stop the press, company accused of doing a bad thing issues a statement to say that they did not do the bad thing.

The Jacobs report is pants. It has Hull Trains abstracting more money from Grantham, Retford and Doncaster than it actually received! 30% more in one year alone! The suspicion is that Jacobs counted everything that is not LNER on the relevant “London to” flow as OA which, of course, is rubbish.

 

[D1537]

Looking at the bigger picture I can understand why Durham doesn't merit the status of Newcastle or Darlington on LNER, as it's so close to both stations and hardly an interchange.

You may be surprised to learn that there are more passenger journeys from Durham per year than Darlington.

 

[Starmill]

However if Cross Country trains can be lengthened (and nasal clothes pegs issued to counter the aroma of poo from the toilets) these should be tolerable alternatives.

If you are genuinely expecting these to happen, and this isn't tongue-in-cheek, then you are going to be disappointed I fear.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 7 Sep 2025 ==

Looking at the bigger picture I can understand why Durham doesn't merit the status of Newcastle or Darlington on LNER, as it's so close to both stations and hardly an interchange.

Durham has a bigger market and catchment than Darlington.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 7 Sep 2025 ==

Timetabling various requirements on to a congested network always results in compromises.

It has taken scores of experienced timetabling folk about five years to get to this point.

By all means have a go at producign one yourself.

The person you're quoting doesn't seem to be criticising the people who have had input to the work. I know one of them well myself. They've all done rather good jobs.

Sadly few people seem to believe that's enough. They're working within the parameters they've been set, after all.

 

[Tetchytyke]

Berwick is (just about) in England. It is losing LNER trains (they're doing to 1tp2h) but the TPE trains ensure its still 2tph to both Edinburgh and Newcastle

Except in the middle of the afternoon when it isn’t.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 7 Sep 2025 ==

For hopefully the last time, Lumo isn’t primarily competing with LNER.

Yes it is.

Yes yes, I know Lumo like to pretend that they’re really competing with easyJet and that LNER don’t even cross their radar. But the evidence from the Jacobs Report is that open access is costing LNER £100m a year.

It probably isn’t quite that much, but even if the report inflated it by 50% that’s still £50m a year they’re abstracting.

The idea that Lumo are only attracting people from EasyJet is a nonsense. Especially as Lumo’s biggest market is Newcastle (hence their extra path to Newcastle) where there isn’t a low cost airline. They’re attracting people from LNER by operating identical trains to LNER but slightly undercutting them. The fact there’s been a slight modal shift from air has more to do with the disastrous airport experience since Covid. Two hour queues to get through security tend to push people towards the train.

Cutting services at Durham so Lumo can run more piddly little 5-carriage trains unimpeded. Madness.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 7 Sep 2025 ==

You may be surprised to learn that there are more passenger journeys from Durham per year than Darlington.

Darlington’s benefit has always been as an interchange station for the Tees Valley, especially since Operation Princess killed off the direct Newcastle-Darlington-Middlesbrough trains. But that status isn’t quite the same now there’s a useful train service down the Durham Coast.

 

[bramling]

Funnily enough other than my local journeys around Edinburgh, the trip between Durham and Edinburgh is probably the one I make most frequently. Durham station certainly feels moderately busy although many passengers seem to be making short hops.

Admittedly the LNER trains we normally use from Edinburgh at about 8am and back from Durham at about 4.25pm will both disappear. However if Cross Country trains can be lengthened (and nasal clothes pegs issued to counter the aroma of poo from the toilets) these should be tolerable alternatives. Changing at Newcastle is often an option too. As we need to take a taxi south from Durham anyway, there's also the possibility of using the train to Darlington then catching a taxi north to our destination instead.

So personally it's an inconvenience but hardly the end of the world.

Looking at the bigger picture I can understand why Durham doesn't merit the status of Newcastle or Darlington on LNER, as it's so close to both stations and hardly an interchange.

The closeness to Darlington and Newcastle would be okay if there was something like a half-hourly EMU service connecting them all, but there isn’t. Relying on XC is problematic as they don’t provide much capacity, what capacity they do have is shared with the longer distance passengers, their services can’t readily be lengthened just to cater for specific short-distance flows, and being long-distance their timekeeping is always going to be risky.

 

[Peter A]

With regard to Durham vs Darlington - the original timetable had the Edinburgh semi-fast as stopping at Darlington once every two hours and Durham the other hour - this has clearly been changed to Darlington receiving the hourly call. Does anyone know why this change was made? If it hadn't, you might have argued it would have resulted in a more suitable provision at Durham at the expense of Darlington, albeit with both retaining an hourly Crosscountry service.

 

[800001]

With regard to Durham vs Darlington - the original timetable had the Edinburgh semi-fast as stopping at Darlington once every two hours and Durham the other hour - this has clearly been changed to Darlington receiving the hourly call. Does anyone know why this change was made? If it hadn't, you might have argued it would have resulted in a more suitable provision at Durham at the expense of Darlington, albeit with both retaining an hourly Crosscountry service.

most likely down to the Tees Valley Mayor insisting on Darlington calls.

 

[Kite159]

Yes it is.

Yes yes, I know Lumo like to pretend that they’re really competing with easyJet and that LNER don’t even cross their radar. But the evidence from the Jacobs Report is that open access is costing LNER £100m a year.

It probably isn’t quite that much, but even if the report inflated it by 50% that’s still £50m a year they’re abstracting.

And without competition from those pesky open access operators, LNER would be free to charge what they liked, not just for London to Newcastle/Edinburgh but for London to Doncaster/Wakefield/York which have competition.

When it can be cheaper to book an advance from Wakefield to London in conjunction with an standard single from Leeds to Wakefield compared to the price of an advance from Leeds to London, shows the effect of competition. Remove the competition and advance fares will simply get increased. Especially on the West Yorkshire trains being planned as 5 coach units

 

[mernrith]

Funnily enough other than my local journeys around Edinburgh, the trip between Durham and Edinburgh is probably the one I make most frequently. Durham station certainly feels moderately busy although many passengers seem to be making short hops.

Admittedly the LNER trains we normally use from Edinburgh at about 8am and back from Durham at about 4.25pm will both disappear. However if Cross Country trains can be lengthened (and nasal clothes pegs issued to counter the aroma of poo from the toilets) these should be tolerable alternatives. Changing at Newcastle is often an option too. As we need to take a taxi south from Durham anyway, there's also the possibility of using the train to Darlington then catching a taxi north to our destination instead.

So personally it's an inconvenience but hardly the end of the world.

Looking at the bigger picture I can understand why Durham doesn't merit the status of Newcastle or Darlington on LNER, as it's so close to both stations and hardly an interchange.

I don't think you get how messed up it is for Durham. Yes flows to Newcastle is a country mile higher than other flows, but it will get heavily messed up as well by this timetable change.
It'd take at least 27 minutes for one to transfer to another LNER to Edinburgh at Newcastle, and the short hops which carry the major of passengers will be so unequally spaced that I'd prefer a bus to be honest.
XCs seldom ran 8 cars and given where they origin, I don't think it could be on time or tolerable than LNERs which both are currently running. 2tph of a combination of at least 13 cars (regardless of actual capacity) being stripped to 1 tph of 4 or 5 cars.
It's not the end of the world, you're right, but I would predict some plummet of passenger usage.

 

[Allwinter_Kit]

Especially on the West Yorkshire trains being planned as 5 coach units

I have waded through this thread but I appear to have missed, in one place, what's happening to West Yorkshire services. As far as i can tell:

- a 2 minute (?) time saving (I mean - not going to make a difference but sure, thanks)
- more services running through to Bradford Forster Square (sure, good for Bradford)
- services remain half-hourly (again, fine I suppose, although it's not that much of a smaller flow than Edinburgh which seems to merit rejigging the whole thing to get 3 tph)
- it appears from the last few pages most services are now 5 cars rather than 9/2x5s?

That last one seems madness. What's the rationale for it? That's basically halving capacity on one of their busier flows isn't it?! So I am assuming I have misinterpreted the thread - could someone enlighten me please?

 

[weeklycommuter]

I don't think you get how messed up it is for Durham. Yes flows to Newcastle is a country mile higher than other flows, but it will get heavily messed up as well by this timetable change.
It'd take at least 27 minutes for one to transfer to another LNER to Edinburgh at Newcastle, and the short hops which carry the major of passengers will be so unequally spaced that I'd prefer a bus to be honest.
XCs seldom ran 8 cars and given where they origin, I don't think it could be on time or tolerable than LNERs which both are currently running. 2tph of a combination of at least 13 cars (regardless of actual capacity) being stripped to 1 tph of 4 or 5 cars.
It's not the end of the world, you're right, but I would predict some plummet of passenger usage.

Again the solution is surely persuading the Government to get around 20 new full length trains with around 600 seats for Cross Country to use for the hourly Edinburgh-Plymouth service. If the Durham-Edinburgh service is important to enough people and they all lobby their mainly Labour MPs the Government will do this. The Government just needs to be persuaded that this is important for voters in red wall seats. The December 2025 ECML timetable would surely be fine if the XC Edinburgh-Plymouth trains had enough seats.

 

[D1537]

- it appears from the last few pages most services are now 5 cars rather than 9/2x5s?

That last one seems madness. What's the rationale for it? That's basically halving capacity on one of their busier flows isn't it?! So I am assuming I have misinterpreted the thread - could someone enlighten me please?

The requirement to run two trains between Kings Cross and Edinburgh every hour plus a Kings Cross-Newcastle service has taken additional 9-car Azuma resources.

However, around two-thirds of Leeds services are still 9-car, it's just that the number that are 5-car has increased slightly since the last timetable and there are now very few 10-car services as the 5-car Azumas have been deployed elsewhere.

The bigger losers as regards 5-car trains are the 2-hourly York semi-fast services (which are now all 5-car rather than 9-car) and the stations served by the Newcastle services (a significant number of those services are also 5-car).

 

[43 302]

And without competition from those pesky open access operators, LNER would be free to charge what they liked, not just for London to Newcastle/Edinburgh but for London to Doncaster/Wakefield/York which have competition.

When it can be cheaper to book an advance from Wakefield to London in conjunction with an standard single from Leeds to Wakefield compared to the price of an advance from Leeds to London, shows the effect of competition. Remove the competition and advance fares will simply get increased. Especially on the West Yorkshire trains being planned as 5 coach units

What a load of nonsense. The idea that LUMOs existence affects KX to Leeds fares is laughable. In fact I'd argue it doesn't even affect their Anglo-Scottish fares, as LUMO quite clearly undercuts LNER thanks to it's significantly lower OpEx due to running DCO, amongst other things.

The fares system is broken, don't get me wrong. But a handful of extra five car services are not going to change that. If we want improved fares on the railway, we need increased capacity (supply) to match the already high demand. For the York & Newcastle, this is one of the things the ESG timetable does well. Hopefully, 2.5tph to Leeds can be achieved next.

 

[Allwinter_Kit]

However, around two-thirds of Leeds services are still 9-car, it's just that the number that are 5-car has increased slightly since the last timetable and there are now very few 10-car services as the 5-car Azumas have been deployed elsewhere.

The bigger losers as regards 5-car trains are the 2-hourly York semi-fast services (which are now all 5-car rather than 9-car) and the stations served by the Newcastle services (a significant number of those services are also 5-car).

Ah brilliant, thanks. That's definitely better for WYorks then it sounded - thought I had it wrong!

 

[mernrith]

Again the solution is surely persuading the Government to get around 20 new full length trains with around 600 seats for Cross Country to use for the hourly Edinburgh-Plymouth service. If the Durham-Edinburgh service is important to enough people and they all lobby their mainly Labour MPs the Government will do this. The Government just needs to be persuaded that this is important for voters in red wall seats. The December 2025 ECML timetable would surely be fine if the XC Edinburgh-Plymouth trains had enough seats.

You really think that the solution to fix a wrong doing schedule is to make more trains in the future and let them run on this inappropriate schedule that does not meet the regions needs?

 

[bramling]

Looks like Stevenage has now discovered the pick up/set down thing. Article in the local paper about it, and the local MP is now on the case. Surprised it took this long to be noticed.

 

[Starmill]

- it appears from the last few pages most services are now 5 cars rather than 9/2x5s?

I am not sure it is most, I think it is a small number of services overall. There may be a small net loss of capacity on London - Leeds while the initial phase sees one round trip withdrawn. I am unclear if there would still be an overall net loss once it's back.

 

[800001]

I am not sure it is most, I think it is a small number of services overall. There may be a small net loss of capacity on London - Leeds while the initial phase sees one round trip withdrawn. I am unclear if there would still be an overall net loss once it's back.

Not forgetting any services operated by Mk4 will also of lost 2 coaches by start of December timetable.

 

[Bletchleyite]

I am not sure it is most, I think it is a small number of services overall. There may be a small net loss of capacity on London - Leeds while the initial phase sees one round trip withdrawn. I am unclear if there would still be an overall net loss once it's back.

Not forgetting any services operated by Mk4 will also of lost 2 coaches by start of December timetable.

Though the arrival of the CAF stock (which is both longer than and able to be diagrammed more intensively than the Mk4s remaining) will solve this, no? Indeed presumably that's why this was ordered?

 

[D1537]

I am not sure it is most, I think it is a small number of services overall. There may be a small net loss of capacity on London - Leeds while the initial phase sees one round trip withdrawn. I am unclear if there would still be an overall net loss once it's back.

• 225s - 15 services
• 10-car Azuma - 4 services
• 9-car Azuma 800/1 - 13 services
• 9-car Azuma 801/2 - 19 services
• 5-car Azuma - 15 services

All of the Harrogates are 9-car 800/1s, because they interwork with KGX-ABD/INV diagrams, except 1D11/1A25 which is definitely a 5-car 800/2 (it forms half of a 10-car later on in the diagram).

The temporarily "missing" Harrogate diagram is also a 9-car.

 

[cuccir]

On the Durham issue, worth noting that LNER have reinstated the 08:22 (now at 08:24) which makes a huge difference for commuters (such as me!). In the provisional timetable, there was northbound only a single service between 07:48 and 08:39, that being the 08:07 TPE which can be unreliable and prone to being cancelled in York after getting caught delayed in traffic around Manchester/Leeds. Now we have back in there what will be at least a 5 car service coming only from Darlington and getting in before 09:00, which is a great back up in the event of earlier services being disrupted.

Though the BBC article doesn't report it, this has included a lot of lobbying from the local MP and letter-writing/complaints from commuters. Glad that they have reinstated it, thoguh a bit frustrating that it has taken so much effort.

From a commuting perspective, I'd say the Durham-Newcastle flow is now actually slightly better, with an earlier first northbound train at 06:33, and a better pacing of services between 07:00 and 09:00. For London things are more or less the same, with the exception of the reduced Sunday service. It's really just the leisure travel to Newcastle which takes a hit with the ~45 minute gap, and the loss of services to Edinburgh.

Overall it's probably slightly worse but not the disaster that was originally published.

 

[ChrisC]

There’s been quite a lot of discussion concerning travel from Retford to other stations on the ECML but I can’t recall reading anything about connections at Retford.

I’ve only just looked at the times of trains at Retford from December and see how the connections will be so poor for anyone travelling to the north from the Worksop direction. There have always been a a good number of passengers changing at Retford onto the 2 hourly Kings Cross to York trains but in the new timetable this connection will be missed in both directions by just a few minutes. In addition to almost an hour wait for passengers from Worksop to/from the north this also makes journeys from the Mansfield area to the north via Worksop and Retford almost unusable due to long waits at both Worksop and Retford. Travelling via Sheffield can result in much higher fares for some journeys. Many of the connections at Retford onto the Hull Trains services are little better.

 

[Tetchytyke]

And without competition from those pesky open access operators, LNER would be free to charge what they liked, not just for London to Newcastle/Edinburgh but for London to Doncaster/Wakefield/York which have competition.

LNER are already free to charge what they want. They will sometimes increase the number of lower-tier advances on the trains either side of Lumo, to match Lumo prices, but not always. Apart from then, LNER already do charge what they want. That's the whole point of the fares trial.

My point about Lumo is not that they're good, bad, or indifferent, my point is that connectivity at Durham is being destroyed just so an open access operator can have a fancy path at certain times of day. The rationale given higher up the thread was that the KGX-EDB semi-fast couldn't stop at Durham because it would get in the way of the Lumo, even though the Lumo doesn't even run every hour. That is the very definition of the tail wagging the dog.

The December 2025 ECML timetable would surely be fine if the XC Edinburgh-Plymouth trains had enough seats.

It would be better if intermediate passengers weren't all being funnelled onto chronically overcrowded XC trains, but it wouldn't be "fine".

The issue isn't just the number of seats, it is frequency too. Durham-Newcastle and vice versa having 45-minute gaps in service is a nonsense. With three trains in 15 minutes it is effectively and essentially 1tph, as you generally need to be at the station 5-10 minutes before your train.

Pre-Covid, when XC were still pretending to run a proper service, the gap between trains was 29 minutes at most. Now it is 43 minutes. It is ridiculous.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 8 Sep 2025 ==

On the Durham issue, worth noting that LNER have reinstated the 08:22 (now at 08:24) which makes a huge difference for commuters (such as me!). In the provisional timetable, there was northbound only a single service between 07:48 and 08:39

Credit to LNER for actually doing that. When I saw the gap in the draft timetable I had a horrible feeling that either the gap would remain or that the gap would be filled with a 2-carriage Northern service (as many of the other early trains are).

 

[D1537]

On the Durham issue, worth noting that LNER have reinstated the 08:22 (now at 08:24) which makes a huge difference for commuters (such as me!). In the provisional timetable, there was northbound only a single service between 07:48 and 08:39, that being the 08:07 TPE which can be unreliable and prone to being cancelled in York after getting caught delayed in traffic around Manchester/Leeds. Now we have back in there what will be at least a 5 car service coming only from Darlington and getting in before 09:00, which is a great back up in the event of earlier services being disrupted.

For us poor unfortunates from Northallerton, though, we're now dependent on that flaky TPE as the first LNER service to Newcastle is at 8.49. It surely wouldn't have broken the timetable to stop 1S02 at Northallerton (as its equivalent 1S01 does now), it starts at Doncaster and there's literally sod all going north at that time.