Caledonian Sleeper

Caledonian Sleeper

Caledonian Sleeper with 92038 in Serco midnight teal livery, at Euston, April 2015
Overview
Franchise(s)	Part of ScotRail (31 March 1997 – 30 March 2015) Standalone franchise (31 March 2015 – present)
Main region(s)	Greater London South East England North West England Scotland
Fleet size	75 Mark 5 carriages
Stations called at	48
Parent company	Scottish Rail Holdings
Reporting mark	CS[1]
Other
Website	www.sleeper.scot
Route map

Caledonian Sleeper is the collective name for overnight sleeper train services between London and Scotland, in the United Kingdom. It is one of only two currently operating sleeper services on the railway in the United Kingdom, the other being the Night Riviera which runs between London and Penzance.

A sleeper service has been run along the West Coast Main Line since 24 February 1873. Sleepers were historically run on the rival East Coast Main Line as well; however, all remaining sleeper services that ran on the east coast routes were withdrawn in May 1988. While InterCity continued to operate what would later become known as the Caledonian Sleeper, it decided to remove all seating accommodation on its remaining sleeper services during the mid-1990s. The Anglo-Scottish sleeper services were transferred to ScotRail on 5 March 1995; as a consequence of the privatisation of British Rail, on 31 March 1997, the service was privatised as a part of the wider ScotRail franchise, initially being operated by National Express. Seated Mark 2 carriages were re-added to the service alongside the Mark 3 sleeping cars, the latter were also refurbished, from January 2000.

On 17 October 2004, the ScotRail franchise and thus the Caledonian Sleeper, was transferred to FirstGroup. Since April 2015, the Caledonian Sleeper has been structured as a standalone franchise. It was operated by Serco under the supervision of the Scottish Government. As a part of its successful bid, Serco had pledged to invest £100 million into the service, which was to be spent on, amongst other things, procuring new rolling stock. During 2019, a new fleet of Mark 5 carriages were introduced, replacing the British Rail-era carriages. These are hauled by a combination of Class 92 electric locomotives (on electrified sections only) and rebuilt Class 73/9s electro-diesel locomotives; prior traction withdrawn in 2019 included Class 67, Class 87 and Class 90 locomotives.

Two services depart London Euston each night from Sunday to Friday and travel via the West Coast Main Line to Scotland. The earlier departure divides at Edinburgh into portions for Aberdeen, Fort William and Inverness. The later departure serves Edinburgh and Glasgow, splitting at Carstairs. Five London-bound portions depart from these destinations each night, combining into two trains at Edinburgh and Carstairs.

Serco's contract concluded early in June 2023, and the service was taken into public ownership by Transport Scotland. It is operated on its behalf by Scottish Rail Holdings.