Sunderland-London train operator Grand Central named country's 'second-most unreliable'

Train company Grand Central says it is working hard to overcome "performance challenges" after it was named as Britain's second least reliable operator after a study by travel deal website Tripplo.com.

According to Tripplo's data 12.32% - one in eight - of all Grand Central trains were either cancelled or delayed by at least 15 minutes between January 2021 and September 2023.

Travellers who used Grand Central, run by Arriva, lost a total of 114,069 minutes due to delays, the equivalent to 79 days of travel.

One of the train company's main routes is the Sunderland-King's Cross journey, which has stops including Hartlepool and York.

London North Eastern Railway (LNER), which runs direct trains between Newcastle and London, was named as fifth worst with 10.43% of all trains being either cancelled or "seriously late". LNER passengers lost a total of 771,744 minutes to delays; equivalent to 535 days of travel lost.

Worst of all was the Avanti West Coast service, with a massive 15.36% - more than one in six of their trains - cancelled or delayed.

Earlier this month the Echo reported on a Sunderland councillor's criticism of Grand Central after passengers heading to Sunderland on Thursday, March 28 were "left stranded and forced to buy brand new tickets with no promise of a refund" when a service was cancelled due to a broken down train.

Last June Grand Central admitted to “reliability issues with the current fleet of 180s”. The British Rail Class 180 locomotive has not been built since 2001.

Grand Central say they are tackling the issues.

Their chief operating officer Sean English said: “The Grand Central team has been working hard to overcome the performance challenges our customers experienced during 2023, by investing in our fleet at the same time as securing leases for additional trains.

"While there is still more to do, I’m pleased to say that this has already had a real positive impact on our service reliability and that the number of cancellations, especially late notice cancellations, is significantly reduced, as demonstrated by the most recent industry performance figures.”