British Rail Mark 3 - Introduction

Introduction

In the late 1960s British Rail had modernised its rolling stock fleet on its key long distance routes with the introduction of the air-conditioned Mark 2 coach and was implementing extensive plans to alter track geometry and rework slow sections of track with the aim of decreasing journey times and improving passenger comfort and overall experience, however the railway continued losing passengers to car and air. The brand "Inter-City" was created to show off these improvements including the electrification of the West Coast Main Line (Glasgow, Preston, Manchester, Liverpool to London Euston) and new air-conditioned versions of Mk 2 coaches. Elsewhere the French, German and Italian railways were steadily electrifying their main routes and providing new comfortable and smooth running rolling stock, while in Japan the new purpose-built Tokaido line was opened with 125mph air-conditioned rolling stock.

Under the chairmanship of Stanley Raymond, the decision was made to reduce journey times further on long-distance trains by increasing line speed to 125mph where practical - the maximum considered possible on Britain's Victorian-age railway.

At the end of 1968 proposals were submitted to the Commercial and Operating Departments of British Rail for a new fleet of third-generation British Rail standard coaching stock designed to run at 125mph

The rapid development required for the Inter-City 125 High Speed Train (HST) in 1969 made the Mk 3 coach design the obvious choice for this train and in 1972, 10 coaches for the prototype HST were completed.