Trivia: "InterCity" Services That Don't/ Didn't Stop At Any Intermediate Cities

[tbtc]

Following on from this thread (https://www.railforums.co.uk/thread...-intercity-network.229388/page-4#post-5582993) - are/were there many "InterCity" services that didn't stop at any intermediate cities (i.e. ignoring the original and final stations)?

For the purposes of definition, let's say:

• Since I'm talking InterCity, let's say anything from the past fifty years counts
• Can be a one-a day/ rare working or something more regular
• Anything where most carriages were branded in InterCity livery (in BR days) qualifies, regardless of top speed (so an InterCity liveried 47 moonlighting on "local" trains wouldn't count, but anything operated by coaches with the red striped livery would count. regardless of what it was hauled by)
• Anything operated by 125mph trains (HSTs, 180/220/221/222/395/397/800/801/802/803 or hauled by 91s) qualifies, regardless of distance or the top speed that the service reaches
• A "city" is something listed here - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_cities_in_the_United_Kingdom
• There will be some grey areas about what is a stop in a city (e.g. I wouldn't class a Shipley stop on an LNER service as being "Bradford", although it is in Bradford for local council purposes, but maybe Bristol Parkway should be classed as Bristol since it has Bristol in it's name?)
• I'm ignoring multiple stops in the same city (e.g. Haymarket and Waverley, Piccadilly and Oxford Road - those may be an intermediate stop that is in a city, but Haymarket is in Edinburgh, Oxford Road is in Manchester... I'm looking for "unique" cities)
• Greater London is one city, for the purposes of this thread (I'm not getting into semantics about the City Of Westminster and the City Of London - so Javelins stopping at Stratford are still serving the same city that St Pancras is in)

A few examples from different parts of the country, and different eras:

• The daily XC service from Dundee to Aberdeen (essentially the positioning move for the Aberdeen - Penzance service) - whilst Dundee and Aberdeen are cities, it doesn't stop at any cities in between
• Liverpool to London generally just stops at towns (e.g. Runcorn, Crewe, Stafford)
• Gatwick Express was part of InterCity (but only served one city)

Over to you...

 

[NorthOxonian]

The Oxford - Paddington express services would appear to qualify - currently worked by 802s, and neither Reading nor Slough are cities.

Edit: Come to think of it, so would Cheltenham - Paddington (Gloucester and London), as well Bristol Temple Meads - Paddington via Bristol Parkway (Bristol and London). I suppose the fact that the major places the line passes through like Swindon and Reading are towns not cities makes these services fairly common on the Great Western Railway.

 

[Mag_seven]

Glasgow Qs - Falkirk High - Edinburgh in the 80s - the Class 47/7 hauled Mark 3 sets were branded "Scotrail Intercity".

 

[Halish Railway]

Prior to the introduction of Class 360s Corby to London was served by either Intercity quality HSTs and Meridians, yet the only city it served was London and the only other city that it could serve it went straight through (St Albans).

I guess the same could still be said for Melton Mowbray to London, although that is a lot less regular than Corby to London and the occasional Kettering to Corby shuttles that were worked by 222s.

 

[Taunton]

• The daily XC service from Dundee to Aberdeen (essentially the positioning move for the Aberdeen - Penzance service) - whilst Dundee and Aberdeen are cities, it doesn't stop at any cities in between

Probably because there aren't any

Glasgow Qs - Falkirk High - Edinburgh in the 80s - the Class 47/7 hauled Mark 3 sets were branded "Scotrail Intercity".

Always stopped at Haymarket, Edinburgh being about the only city I can recall which has two intermediate stations within the inner city, takes about 45 minutes to walk between them - but often a third or more of the train gets out at Haymarket.

 

[hexagon789]

Would Glasgow/Edinburgh-Inverness count? "Inter-City"/"InterCity", later "Inter-City Scotrail" and latterly just "ScotRail" branded Mk2s with either BR Blue, Large Logo, InterCity or ScotRail livery 47s. No cities en-route but I suppose Inverness wasn't a city back then either, so perhaps it doesn't count under the OP's terms?

There was also in the mid-80s a Sunday morning Aberdeen-Glasgow QS service worked by an HST vice internal stock but Dundee was an intermediate stop and that was a city then as now.

As you can tell by my dredging the barrel of lower-grade InterCity stock worked services I'm struggling for one that fits the OP's criteria precisely!

Glasgow Qs - Falkirk High - Edinburgh in the 80s - the Class 47/7 hauled Mark 3 sets were branded "Scotrail Intercity".

"Inter-City Scotrail" rather than "Scotrail InterCity"

And from late-1984 repainted into the new ScotRail livery and the "ScotRail Express" brand was launched and the coaches branded simply "Scotrail" and very slightly later with the "R" capitalised - "ScotRail" after studies showed people were reading "Scotrail" as Sco trail rather than Scot rail.

 

[Peter0124]

Manchester-Euston stopping only at Stockport (Stockport is part of Greater Manchester therefore does this count?)

 

[Watershed]

Manchester-Euston stopping only at Stockport (Stockport is part of Greater Manchester therefore does this count?)

Stockport isn't a city, anyway. But I don't think there are many, if any of these services left.

 

[Mag_seven]

"Inter-City Scotrail" rather than "Scotrail InterCity"

Well whatever but you got my jist.

1974 "Royal Scot": Euston - Glasgow only calling at Preston.

 

[Peter0124]

Stockport isn't a city, anyway. But I don't think there are many, if any of these services left.

Its a pre covid service so I wonder if it'll ever return. Infact it existed in September 2020.

 

[py_megapixel]

Manchester-Euston stopping only at Stockport (Stockport is part of Greater Manchester therefore does this count?)

Stockport isn't a city, anyway. But I don't think there are many, if any of these services left.

I don't think there are any that call at only Stockport, but there's one an hour calling only at Stockport, Wilmslow and Crewe, which are not cities - although Stockport and Crewe have both bid for city status in the past I think.

 

[irish_rail]

The Oxford - Paddington express services would appear to qualify - currently worked by 802s, and neither Reading nor Slough are cities.

Edit: Come to think of it, so would Cheltenham - Paddington (Gloucester and London), as well Bristol Temple Meads - Paddington via Bristol Parkway (Bristol and London). I suppose the fact that the major places the line passes through like Swindon and Reading are towns not cities makes these services fairly common on the Great Western Railway.

The fact Reading is still not yet a city is a bit of a shambles when you look at some of the places which ARE official cities.
Reading has a far better case than anywhere else yet is continually overlooked for some reason!

 

[Peter0124]

I don't think there are any that call at only Stockport, but there's one an hour calling only at Stockport, Wilmslow and Crewe, which are not cities - although Stockport and Crewe have both bid for city status in the past I think.

It was a pre covid service sadly

 

[cle]

Even putting the city status things aside, there aren’t many non-stop or one stop services like France has - eg many which are only Lyon/Aix and Marseille. Our inter city routes tend to 4-5 stops on the faster patterns.

 

[johnnychips]

Hull Trains services that don’t start at Beverley do not call at any cities except Hull and London.

 

[Bertie the bus]

I'm not 100% on this but there was an 06:57 departure from Preston back in the 1980s which I think originated at Lancaster, used the Trent Valley route and had limited stops. I think that would have qualified as Preston wasn't a city back then and I'm certain it didn't stop at Lichfield or Milton Keynes.

 

[sjm77]

Gatwick Express was branded as InterCity and ran none stop from Victoria to Gatwick

 

[ge-gn]

London to Norwich Intercity services, did not for many years, call at the only City in between them. That of Chelmsford.

 

[Bertie the bus]

Another WCML one from the 80's was a 22:xx Crewe - Blackpool which connected with the last Euston - Liverpool departure. I don't know if it was branded as InterCity but it was an AC electric + LHCS and that didn't serve any cities at all. Certainly later in the 80's it couldn't have been considered InterCity as I had a Pacer on it just before it was discontinued but whether it was InterCity earlier on is a grey area.

 

[jamesst]

Is Stafford a city? If not then Liverpool to London?

 

[hexagon789]

Is Stafford a city? If not then Liverpool to London?

Stafford is a town

 

[43074]

London to Leicester - both when part of the 90 minute cycle that made up the MML timetable in the late 1980s and today with the 0015 from St Pancras. The balancing 0440 Leicester to London hasn't run since May 2021 as it now starts from Derby IIRC.

 

[g22]

London to Leicester - both when part of the 90 minute cycle that made up the MML timetable in the late 1980s and today with the 0015 from St Pancras. The balancing 0440 Leicester to London hasn't run since May 2021 as it now starts from Derby IIRC.

As far as I am aware the 0015 has also run to Derby as from the May 21 timetable.

 

[A S Leib]

London Paddington - (Westbury) - Exeter / Paignton

London Euston - Chester (but not Bangor / Holyhead)

 

[Watershed]

Is Stafford a city? If not then Liverpool to London?

Yep, was mentioned in the original post.

Perhaps surprisingly, London to Preston and London to Manchester services both qualify (albeit the latter only on trains that go via Crewe - as Stoke is a city).

 

[The exile]

Any London to Norwich trains that don’t stop at Chelmsford. Any London - Exeter trains via the Berks and Hants.

 

[Grecian 1998]

London Paddington - (Westbury) - Exeter / Paignton

Paddington - Exeter semi-fasts would count, but Paignton trains wouldn't unless they omitted Exeter. I think some Cornish services have omitted Exeter in the past but never heard of Paignton trains doing so.

 

[plugwash]

Perhaps surprisingly, London to Preston and London to Manchester services both qualify (albeit the latter only on trains that go via Crewe - as Stoke is a city).

Yup London to Manchester and vice-vera via Stockport, Crewe and Wilmslow runs regularly and none of those intermediate stops are cities.

For preston, at least looking at todays timetable it seems all the southbound services start north of Preston so they wouldn't count. There are a handful of northbound services that terminate at preston and some of those that do terminate have extra stops in cities like Lichfield or Birmingham (the birmingham stop was listed as "unadvertised" on realtimetrains to I don't know if it counts). I did find one London to Preston train that didn't stop in any intermediate cities though. the 21:10 departure from Euston calls at Watford, Rugby, Stafford, Crewe, Warrington and Wigan (none of which appear to be cities) before terminating at Preston.

I suspect said London to Preston train will be hard to beat on distance for things that are regularly Scheduled today. Afaict on the WCML pretty much everything stops at Preston and on the ECML pretty much everything stops at York (apart from Lumo but they seem to have intermediate stops in Newcastle).

 

[Magdalia]

For me the classic example of an Inter City train with no intermediate stops is the "Leeds Executive", named in 1973 but introduced in 1966. Times varied slightly in some years but the up train was usually 0730 from Leeds and the down train 1555 from Kings Cross. It ran non-stop in both directions for many years, at least until after HSTs replaced Deltics.

In the period when the "Master Cutler" ran to/from Kings Cross the only intermediate stop was Retford, which I think is not a city.

Parkeston Quay boat trains were non-stop to/from Liverpool Street and ran for many years as Inter City trains.

Though not Inter City trains, for many years the xx15 "Cambridge Cruisers" ran non-stop in each direction between Kings Cross and Cambridge. In the days when the Liverpool Street-Cambridge service was branded Inter City anything starting/terminating Cambridge would qualify, because no intermediate stops were cities, but the nearest thing to a non-stop train was the 173x down which from 1974 called only at Audley End. Anything going north of Cambridge is disqualified because Ely is a city.

One oddity that strikes me is the plentiful examples of Inter City trains where the starting or terminating station is not a city.

 

[LNW-GW Joint]

1974 "Royal Scot": Euston - Glasgow only calling at Preston.

In 1979, BR ran daily non-stop Edinburgh-Euston trains via the WCML, because of the Penmanshiel tunnel collapse on the ECML.
Something similar was set up by Virgin in 2010 during the volcanic ash cloud event, with no domestic air services operating.
They would omit Carlisle, Lancaster and Lichfield. (Preston was chartered as a city in 2002).
There were also extra Holyhead-Euston services in that period, for the Dublin-London route, omitting Bangor, Chester and Lichfield.
All these trains were nominally non-stop, but of course had to stop for crew/traction change en route (Carstairs, Crewe etc).

I don't know about the current timetable, but there are normally several daily non-stop London-Paris Eurostar services.
They define city status abroad differently, but Lille is certainly a city.