On Saturday I went to Liverpool with my youngest, and the overhead lines went down at Crewe, but also there were crew shortages across the land, so between the homophones and my lifelong inability to start listening to a train announcement until halfway through, I cannot tell you at what point this journey became a five-train, four-hour odyssey. All I know is what’s happening on every train, in every part of the country. The 7.48am is a calm and ordered cohort of people who think they know where they’re going and will be there soon. And from 9.04am onwards, everyone’s drunk, all the way to everywhere.

Between Rugby and Birmingham New Street, there was an incredibly festive crowd going to the Horse of the Year show, squishing real fruit into cans of Pimm’s, because it was breakfast time, and also because it was funny. But what were the horses going to make of all this? Because they’re quite short on appreciation for ludic pranking, and famously easy to frighten.

Between Birmingham New Street and Wolverhampton, there was a 40th birthday party with a load of mini-bottles of prosecco, and they were extremely charming and well signposted in some ways (for instance, how did I know it was a 40th? Because of the massive flashing deely-boppers saying “40”), but I still had so many questions. Why buy 15 tiny bottles, when you could get four regular bottles for a fraction of the price, and they would have exactly the same effect? What earthly state are you going to be in when you get there? Is there somewhere you could have a little snooze before your next appointment? Maybe things are different when you’re 40, but I dimly remember it, and it’s not that different.

Between Wolverhampton and Stafford, it’s only 13 minutes, so I was mainly awed by how many people could even be bothered to open a can of Stella. Stafford to Liverpool was a stag do, and it was brunch o’clock by now, so running up and down the carriage, yelling “Ay ay ay” in a fake scouse accent, dressed in a Brazilian flag, all fell under the umbrella “having a normal one”.

I abhor British exceptionalism, except on this one subject: exceptionally bad train network; exceptionally fun trains. Would recommend.

Zoe Williams is a Guardian columnist

The Guardian’s year in review 2026

On Tuesday 1 December 2026, join your favourite Guardian writers for an evening of candid conversations, witty remarks and surprises as we look back on the year-defining stories of 2026. With Zoe Williams, John Crace, Pippa Crerar, Jonathan Liew and Lucy Mangan. Book tickets here or at guardian.live

Flash interiors, fancy food and maybe even a bar: Virgin has unveiled a mock-up of its future cross-Channel train, with a pledge to create “something genuinely new”.

The group is planning to launch rail services from London to the continent in 2030, with Eurostar facing competition for the first time since the opening of the Channel tunnel.

Virgin has ordered 12 trains from the manufacturer Alstom, and will hope to outshine Eurostar on design and customer experience as it fits them out.

While Virgin’s last stab at reimagining UK train travel may have peaked with the talking toilet seat on its intercity services in 2013, it has said the future trains will be inspired from its airline, cruise and hotel arms.

Although details are being kept firmly under wraps, it said it would draw on Virgin Atlantic’s airport lounges, or Clubhouses, for “pre-departure and onboard social spaces” with “more flexibility to work, relax or socialise in style”. Food will be influenced by its cruise line menu and the design by its Virgin Hotels brand.

Josh Bayliss, the chief executive of Virgin Group, said: “Virgin has a proud history in UK rail. With our latest venture we are drawing on more than four decades of experience across travel and hospitality to create something genuinely new.

“We’re confident that more journeys between the UK and Europe will be made by train. We’re adding capacity for millions more international rail journeys each year, growing the market as a whole. We’re looking forward to seeing our distinctive red and black trains travelling across Europe.”

Virgin will also look to connect its rail and airline networks, potentially bringing passengers from France for Virgin Atlantic flights.

The Office of Rail and Road on Thursday published an agreement with Eurostar for Virgin to maintain its trains at the Temple Mills international depot in east London, with track access in the UK confirmed until at least 2040.

Italy’s state-owned Trenitalia is also expected to launch cross-Channel high-speed services. It already runs international trains as far as Paris and recently announced its own €2bn order for 19 new trains from Hitachi, some of which are expected to be based in France and run through the tunnel to London.

Plans to run direct train services to Wrexham and Rochdale from London have been rejected by the rail regulator because of “significant pressure” on the line.

The Office of Rail and Road said that there was insufficient space on the crowded west coast mainline to introduce the two new separate train services.

It also vetoed plans for additional London-Blackpool train services wanted by Avanti.

The ORR had last year knocked back plans for a new independent open access service linking Wrexham and the capital put forward by the Wrexham, Shropshire & Midlands Railway Company (WSMR). WSMR had submitted plans for a slightly less frequent service but the ORR said the new routes would still put the reliability of the wider railway at risk.

The new service could have allowed Wrexham to capitalise further on the town’s Hollywood-meets-football mini-boom, fuelled by the Wrexham AFC co-owners Ryan Reynolds and Rob McElhenney.

Proposals for a new Lumo service between London and Rochdale, again slimmed down after being rejected in 2025, were once more rebuffed.

The ORR also said Avanti could not add more Blackpool services from London. However, it did approve one extra London-Chester evening service from Avanti, which would otherwise have run as a “ghost train”, with crew and the rolling stock returning north to the depot overnight. The decision follows the outcry over the ORR’s initial ruling on a Manchester-London service which was barred from taking passengers last year.

The regulator said its assessment, backed by external reviews, was that the “capacity and performance of the southern section of the west coast mainline has not materially changed since similar applications were rejected in 2025”.

It said gaps in the current timetable were needed to provide important space for trains to recover when things went wrong, rather than escalating chaos.

Stephanie Tobyn, ORR’s director of strategy, policy and reform, said: “New services, destinations and greater choice can bring real benefits for passengers and communities. But the west coast mainline is already under significant pressure, with performance reflecting limited resilience on a heavily used part of the rail network.

“Our detailed analysis has shown that adding more trains to the current timetable would reduce the ability to recover when disruption occurs, increasing the risk of delays spreading and making reliability of the network worse for all passengers.”

Private operators such as First Group, owners of Lumo, have been looking to increase open-access routes – such as Hull Trains and Grand Central – as Labour has renationalised major rail contracts in the transition to Great British Railways.

London-Wrexham direct trains briefly ran from London Marylebone from 2008 to 2011 as an open-access service but stopped owing to financial losses.