The route of the Flying Scotsman

Hiya there, Fox here again with a amazing blog for you guys to read, I'm going to be talking about my favourite train the Flying Scotsman and it route around the UK.

Right Let start!

Although alternative direct routes between London and Edinburgh were investigated by Paraliamentary committees as early as 1839 in practice, what eventually become known as the East Coast Main Line evolved in piecemeal fashion over a period of many years.

The eventual route, as finalised in 1906, totalled 393 miles, and was regularly traversed throughout by LNER 4-6-2 locomotives over a period of almost exactly 40 years (1923-63 ).

Its evolution can be summarised as follows: The routes included four particularly notable stations: London King's cross (opened 1850), and York (1877), Newcastle central (1850), and Edinburgh Waverley (in essenitally it's present from, 1900). It's also ed over three major bridge/vaiducts, i.e Welwyn Viaduct cross the mimram Valley in Hertfordshire, the king Edward bridge spanning the River Tyne between Gateshead and Newcastle, and the royal Border bridge crossing the river tweed between twewdmouth and Berwick-upon-Tweed.

Compared with its west Coast counterpart, running between London Euston and Glasgow, the East Coast line was relatively undemanding, with gradient rarely exceeding 1-in-200. By far the most sustained is the five mile 1-in-96 Cockburnspath bank (southbound) ascending to the Scottish summit at Grantshouse, north of Berwick. The highest point in England is Stoke summit south of Grantham, only some 20ft less at 345ft above sea level, in notably flat county of Lincolnshire. By contrast, the corresponding twin summits on the West Coast Main Line at Beattock (1,033ft), and at Shap (915ft), both involve northbound climbs of several miles 1-in-75, which were also often associated with adverse weather conditions.

The East Coast Main Line has undergone significant changes since the end of steam era, including improved track layouts at Peterborough, where a permanent speed restriction of only 20mph had long been in force. Following a serious structural collapse inside the penmanshiel tunnel, an impromptu by was hastily put in place during 1979, and the selby diversion was completed in 1983.

Colour light signalling, initiated pre-war gradually superseded mechanical semaphores. Full electrification of the East Coast Main Line, proposed in the British Railways Modernisation and Re-Equipment plan announced in January 1955, was not authorised until 1984 and was completed in 1990. In 1919 , the North Eastern Railway had proposed to electrify York-Newcastle (And possibly beyond, through to Edinburgh), even building a prototype 4-6-4 electric locomotive in 1922. although the corresponding infrastructure did not materialise. Prior to the grouping of 1923 the Great Northern Railway had traditionally changed locomotives at the old market town of Granham (105.5 miles north of London), which then ran through to York (a further 82.7 miles) where North Eastern Railway locomotive took over. These in turn were changed at Newcastle (80.1 miles) for the longest single stretch (124.4 miles) on to Edinburgh, which included 57.5 miles over North British Railway metals north of Berwick. In 1928, a select band of 4-6-2s would begin to run almost 400 miles between London and Edinburgh without any scheduled stops en route, a unique operation which was finally terminated in September 1961.

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