Golden Spanner’ win for fourth year in a row

CrossCountry has once again won the rail industry's highest accolade for fleet reliability, a 'Golden Spanner', for their Class 220 'Voyager' fleet. The Voyagers were rewarded for being the most reliable Intercity train in the UK. The award was announced at the industry recognised Spanner awards in London on 22^nd November 2013, organised by Modern Railways Magazine. This is the fifth consecutive year that the Voyager fleet has been recognised as the most reliable in their category.

All passenger trains in the UK are ranked on the distance they cover between technical faults by the Association of Train Operating Companies (ATOC) and for the fifth consecutive year the  CrossCountry Voyager fleet is best in class for the 'Intercity' Category, see league table below;

The CrossCountry Voyager fleet is maintained by Bombardier at the Central Rivers Depot Facility in Burton on Trent. Stacy Thundercliffe, Voyager Fleet Manager at CrossCountry said "We are incredibly proud that the CrossCountry Voyager fleet has now won a Golden Spanner for five consecutive years, this excellent achievement demonstrates the excellent inter-working relationship that has been established between CrossCountry Trains and Bombardier. Improving and sustaining train reliability is important to our passengers and will therefore remain a priority for us moving forward."

Notes to editors

The CrossCountry network is the most extensive passenger rail franchise in Britain. Stretching from Aberdeen to Penzance, and from Stansted to Cardiff, it calls at over 100 stations. Based in Birmingham, CrossCountry connects seven of the Britain's 10 largest cities and delivers 295 services every weekday, equating to some 32 million passenger journeys a year.

CrossCountry

CrossCountry started operating on 11 November 2007. The franchise, which is the most extensive in the UK, will run until 31 March 2016. For further information on CrossCountry services and future franchise plans log on to crosscountrytrains.co.uk.

CrossCountry is part of the Arriva group, which is owned by Deutsche Bahn. Arriva is a leading pan-European public transport operators with more than 42,000 employees and operations across 12 European countries. The link to Arriva is www.arriva.co.uk. The link to Deutsche Bahn is deutschebahn.com.

Like CrossCountry on Facebook at facebook.com/crosscountrytrains.

Follow CrossCountry on Twitter via twitter.com/crosscountryuk.

CrossCountry bookings

Passengers can buy tickets for any rail journey in Britain, with any train company and with no booking fee at crosscountrytrains.co.uk or via the free CrossCountry Train Tickets app.Download the app by visiting your app store or by texting TRAVEL to 87080.

CrossCountry facts and figures

STATIONS SERVED: 119
ROUTE MILES: 1,490
WEEKDAY SERVICES: 295
PASSENGERS CARRIED: Over 30 million passenger journeys a year anticipated
ANNUAL TRAIN MILEAGE: Approximately 16 million
EMPLOYEES: Approximately 1,600
LONGEST TRAIN SERVICE: 08.20 Aberdeen to Penzance (774 miles)  

Contact Information

CrossCountry Press Office: [email protected]

About CrossCountry

CrossCountry is a long-distance passenger train operator, with a network stretching from Aberdeen to Penzance and from Stansted to Cardiff and calling at over 100 stations. Based in Birmingham, CrossCountry connects seven of Britain’s 10 largest cities and delivers 240 services every weekday, equating to over 42 million passenger journeys each year.

For further information on CrossCountry services, visit crosscountrytrains.co.uk or visit one of our social media platforms via X @crosscountryuk or Facebook at facebook.com/crosscountrytrains