The Edinburgh Glasgow Improvement Programme (EGIP) reached another milestone with the first electric train running end-to-end on the main Edinburgh-Glasgow line. One of the new Hitachi Class 385 electric trains travelled between Edinburgh Waverley and Glasgow Queen Street on the night between 31 October and 1 November. Successfully running the first electric train on the line is the culmination of a project which has been a decade in the planning and four years in delivery to upgrade Scotland’s busiest inter-city rail route.
“The achievement of running the route end-to-end is a momentous day for everyone connected with EGIP over the past few years. It is the culmination of years of hard work, dedication and commitment from across the team which has been invested in the project to make this happen. While we acknowledge that delivering a project of this scale to electrify a live railway has not been without its challenges, the experience and learning we have taken from this stands us in good stead to deliver more of the rolling programme of electrification that continues across central Scotland,” Kevin McClelland, route delivery director for infrastructure projects, said.
Representing the biggest transformation of the route its 140-year history, the electrification of 46 miles of railway between Edinburgh and Glasgow, via Falkirk High, marks an important milestone in the delivery of the overall EGIP. A central part of the Scottish Government’s rail strategy, EGIP delivers a 20% reduction in journey times and adds 30% more capacity, on comfortable, efficient and more reliable electric trains.
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