West Coast Main Line
Last updated 25 May 2026
London Euston to Glasgow Central via Crewe, Preston and Carlisle — the principal north-south freight artery of the British network.
| NR route | North West & Central / Scotland |
| Route chain | London Euston – Rugby – Stafford – Crewe – Warrington – Preston – Carlisle – Carstairs – Glasgow Central |
| Key constraints | Trent Valley four-track; Shap and Beattock gradients; Carstairs |
| Trailing 12-period A2F | Fewer than 12 closed periods of clean data on record — available once the pipeline reaches 12 complete periods. |
Latest period summary
West Coast Main Line recorded 74% A2F punctuality in Period 2 2026-27 (26 April – 23 May 2026) on 1,977 freight services, up 1 percentage point from 73% in Period 1 2026-27 on a smaller denominator. The intervals overlap with the prior period. PRELIMINARY at T+2; FINAL re-publication at T+35 after Network Rail's batch correction.
Reports
Operators active
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Methodology & sources
All figures derive from Network Rail's NROD TRUST feed, processed via the Gauge Intelligence ingest pipeline. Period definitions, A2F (Arrival to Fifteen), the Wilson 90% interval, daily anomaly rules, cross-view reconciliation, and delay attribution are documented at:
Data window — period boundaries and the data-as-of cutoff
League tables — cross-view reconciliation across the four analytical views
Anomaly detection — daily A2F SPC rules
Delay attribution — DAPR cause-code breakdown
Forecasting — prediction intervals and possession-exposure estimates
The West Coast Main Line is the principal north-south freight artery of the British network, carrying intermodal, automotive, mail, and nuclear flows between London, the West Midlands, the North West, and Central Scotland. Every Anglo-Scottish FOC operates regular services across the corridor.
Throughput is shaped by the Trent Valley four-track section south of Crewe, the Shap and Beattock gradients between Preston and the Border, and the Carstairs junction in southern Scotland.