Press release -
Virgin Trains unveils its Summer of Pride
- #RideWithPride train to visit all Pride events on Virgin Trains route on the West Coast this summer
- Virgin Trains people join Birmingham Pride celebrations
- Rainbow route map released celebrating Pride events on Virgin Trains’ west coast route
Virgin Trains has today unveiled, their first ‘Pride Train’ at Birmingham New Street station, marking the start of their Summer of Pride celebrations.
The #RideWithPride train, which boldly displays the Pride colours, highlights Virgin Trains’ passion for celebrating diversity and ensuring people can be themselves. The train will travel up and down the UK over the summer. It will also carry customers to the Pride events along the Virgin Trains route on the west coast making sure that supporters feel part of the festivities as soon as they step on board.
This morning the train made its first journey to a Pride event, carrying customers and Virgin Trains own people to Birmingham Pride in style in a joyful celebration of the LGBTQ+ community. There was a true party atmosphere on board the train where everyone got involved in applying colourful face paint, sampling delicious rainbow cakes and waving #RideWithPride flags. Virgin Trains staff have been prominent participants in Birmingham Pride for the past two years, enjoying the parade that passes near their Head Offices in Victoria Square.
To celebrate their Summer of Pride, Virgin Trains has created an easy to read map highlighting the dates for Pride events along the west coast route.
Executive Director sponsor for Virgin Trains west coast’s pride, Sarah Copley, said: “We’re really proud of the diversity of our people. It’s part of what makes Virgin Trains amazing! The #RideWithPride train looks great and I have loved being here at Birmingham Pride today with so many colleagues and customers enjoying the celebrations at the UK’s biggest two-day Pride festival.”
More information about which services will be on the #RideWithPride train are available on @VirginTrains Facebook and Twitter handles.
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About Virgin Trains
Stagecoach and Virgin are working in partnership to operate the West Coast and East Coast inter-city route under the Virgin Trains brand. Together, they are on track to revolutionise rail travel across the UK.
The combined network connects some of the nation’s most iconic destinations including Glasgow, Liverpool, Birmingham, Manchester, Edinburgh, Newcastle, Leeds, York and London.
Virgin Trains is committed to delivering a high speed, high frequency service, offering shorter journey times, more comfortable travel and excellent customer service. Customers consistently rate Virgin Trains the top long-distance rail franchise operators in the National Rail Passenger Survey (NRPS) commissioned by industry watchdog, Transport Focus.
Virgin Trains is operating the East Coast route until June 24, 2018 after taking over the business in March 2015. In that time, we have invested £75m to create a more personalised travel experience, including over £40m in our existing fleet. Customers can now benefit from 48 additional services between Edinburgh and London every week, and an extra 22 Saturday services between Leeds and London – a total of 1.74 million additional seats since May 2015.
The West Coast route has a proud record of challenging the status quo - from introducing tilting Pendolino trains, to a pioneering automated delay repay scheme and becoming the first franchised rail operator to offer m-Tickets for all ticket types.
Working together, the partnership railway of the public and private sectors has published a long-term plan, called In Partnership for Britain’s Prosperity,to change and improve Britain’s railway. The plan will secure almost £85bn of additional economic benefits to the country whilst enabling further investment and improvement, and contains four commitments which will see rail companies: strengthen our economic contribution to the country; improve customers’ satisfaction; boost the communities we serve; and, createmore and better jobs in rail. For more information go to Britain Runs on Rail.
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