Transport User Voice – January 2020 – You and Your Train Company

20 December 2019

Avanti launches West Coast operations 

A new operator took over from Virgin Trains earlier this month. Avanti West Coast is a joint venture between FirstGroup and Trenitalia. Promises for the future include a fleet of new trains to replace Voyagers, refurbished Pendolinos and more trains to places including Liverpool, Motherwell and Llandudno. Simplified ticketing is also on the agenda, which responds to one of the key asks from passengers in Transport Focus research carried out for the franchise.

We’ve been in close contact with Avanti since the start date, urging it to resolve the teething problems that emerged, particularly around seat reservations and carriage loading displays. 

In addition to operating the West Coast mainline services Avanti is also the shadow operator for the future High Speed 2 service. We’ll continue to feed in ideas from the customer community we’ve been running for several years. 

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