ScotRail (brand)
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| Overview | |
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| Main area(s) | Scotland |
| Website | www.scotrail.co.uk |
ScotRail (Scottish Gaelic: Rèile na h-Alba) has been the brand name used for all Scottish regional and commuter rail services, including some cross-border services, since September 1983. Since 2008, it is the permanent name of the Scottish franchised rail services, regardless of the train operating company that operates them.
The ScotRail brand was created by British Railways Scottish Region manager Chris Green in the mid 1980s to provide a distinctive brand for the Regional Railways network in Scotland. The brand has developed and is still in use today.
ScotRail, under BR, used customised versions of the existing British Rail liveries, with passenger locomotives and coaching stock painted in a lightly modified version of the InterCity Executive livery. The red stripe was replaced with a saltire blue stripe, and the InterCity name was replaced with the ScotRail name. Most Diesel Locomotives carried standard InterCity Executive livery, but with ScotRail branding. Diesel and Electric multiple units carried normal versions of the Regional Railways livery. In the SPT area, rolling stock (DMU and EMU) was painted in Strathclyde Orange and Black.
The brand was adopted by National Express Group when it took over the franchise from British Railways during privatisation in 1997. The first unique ScotRail livery was introduced shortly after privatisation under National Express, who introduced their own livery. Initially, vehicles received the new ScotRail logo applied with vinyl stickers; a stylised outline of Scotland composed of three flashes in the corporate colours of green, red and purple. Multiple units were painted into the new livery with bodies in white (lower half) and purple (upper half) with green, red and white stripes bordering the purple, overlain by and a wide diagonal white band in the centre of the carriage. There were no units left with Regional Railways livery in Scotland at the end of the National Express franchise period, although the Class 305 electric units retained it until withdrawal in 2001. The latter were replaced by ex-Stansted Skytrain Class 322 units which were never repainted under the National Express franchise, receiving only ScotRail logo transfers. When the Class 322 hire ended in 2004, they were replaced on the North Berwick branch by English Welsh & Scottish Class 90 electric locomotives hauling former Virgin Trains Mk.3 coaching stock, in the old Virgin red and grey livery, again with ScotRail logo transfers.
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