HAPPY BIRTHDAY HULL TRAINS
DESPITE being a city with a population of slightly more than 250,000, Kingston-upon-Hull, to use its correct name, had just one through inter-city passenger service to and from London in 1999.
Hull is famous for its cream-coloured public telephone kiosks, its City of Culture status in 2017, being the birthplace of slavery abolitionist William Wilberforce, aviator Amy Johnson and actor Sir Tom Courtenay, as well as being a key North Sea port.
Railways arrived in the city in July 1840 when the Hull & Selby Railway Company opened a terminus at Humber Docks, extended services to Bridlington in 1846, before opening a new terminus, Paragon station, in 1848. As was the case in Victorian times, the railway blossomed and connectivity widened for Hull.
In the mid-1960s, BR ran two trains each way on weekdays from London to Hull, with journey times ranging from 3½ hours (on the Hull Pullman) to four hours. By the mid-80s, there were still two trains, but journey time for the fastest train had been cut to three hours thanks to use of InterCity 125s and improved line speeds.
Looking at the winter 2000 timetable, for London passengers, there was just GNER’s 07.05 Up and 17.20 Down ‘Hull Executive’, with a fastest journey time of 2hr 39min. At any other time a change at Doncaster was necessary on a journey to or from the capital. With the single through train clearly aimed at business people, there was scope for an entrepreneurial operation under open access rules.
Partnership
Enter former BR managers John Nelson and Mike Jones. In 1999, they lodged an application with the Office of Rail Regulation (ORR) to begin an open access operation between Hull and London under their Renaissance Trains business.
The pair formed a partnership with GB Railways, which at the time was running Anglia Railways, with GB taking an 80% stake, and the entrepreneurs 10% each.
Granted a four-year track access agreement by the ORR, operations began on September 25, 2000, using four three-car Class 170/2s ‘borrowed’ from Anglia. They operated three services per day, calling at Brough, Selby, Doncaster, Retford (some services initially, now all) and Grantham.
In less than two years, the ORR had extended the track access agreement for 10 years, allowing some positive future planning. Today, Hull Trains has access agreements until 2029, having been granted a further 10 years’ rights last December.
Steady growth on the three
