Royal train in Britain to be retired as King Charles seeks to modernise monarchy

The Royal Train is being scrapped leaving the Royal Family in Britain without a dedicated set of railway carriages for the first time since the mid-nineteenth century.

It is being decommissioned after King Charles concluded the train was too expensive to run and it was being infrequently used.

The train – made up of nine carriages for the exclusive use of the Royal Family – was only in action twice in the last year but those two journeys cost nearly £90,000.

There are also undisclosed payments, estimated to be more than half a million pounds, for the maintenance and storage of the train during the rest of the year when it is not being needed.

The man in charge of finances at the Royal Household, James Chalmers, known as the Keeper of the Privy Purse said: "The Royal Train has, of course, been part of national life for many decades… but in moving forwards we must not be bound by the past.”

Whilst the Royal Family will continue to travel on the train for another two years, it will have completed its final journey before the expiry of its maintenance programme in March 2027.

Chalmers said: “The time has come to bid the fondest of farewells as we seek to be disciplined and forward-looking in our allocation of funding.”

The train carriages needed come costly upgrades so they could continue to travel on the modern-day rail network.

In fact, the carriages are a lot older than many of the trains which rail passengers currently use. The newest ones are actually quite old – and date back to 1986.

Two new helicopters have recently been delivered for the Royal Family and the King has concluded the train is no longer an efficient way to travel.

And neither is it environmentally friendly. Unlike public trains which carry many hundreds of passengers, the royal train uses much more energy per passenger, which means it’s not a sustainable way to travel.

Last year the train was used just twice. Once to take King Charles from Windsor Castle to an engagement in Crewe and then to a station close to his Highgrove home. It cost £33,147.

The other outing on the tracks was for the King to travel from Highgrove to Buton on Trent and back to London for £44,842.

The Royal Train was a favourite of the late Queen Elizabeth who, as an aging monarch, preferred to travel and sleep on it ahead of an engagement - rather travel than stay in a hotel or have to get up very early and travel by helicopter.

It means the Royal Family will be without another of their prestigious modes of transport.

Queen Elizabeth agreed, with a heavy heart, to decommission the Royal Yacht Britannia which made its final journey in 1997.

It was a period of time when royal finances were under intense scrutiny and Britannia became the last in a long line of royal yachts stretching back to 1660.

But the Royal Train remained, the late Queen and Prince Philip particularly enjoyed travelling in two carriages which had been made for them by British Rail in 1977 for Elizabeth’s Silver Jubilee.

But now all nine royal carriages are coming to end of the line.

The first member of the Royal Family to travel on the newly-invented railways was Queen Adelaide, the widow of King William IV.

Queen Victoria followed soon afterwards and in June 1842, she travelled from Slough to London.

Dedicated carriages for Victoria and Prince Albert were subsequently built which means the first ‘royal train’ was used in 1869.

It became a popular choice of travel for the Royal Family from London to Balmoral Castle in Aberdeenshire, although it’s reported that Queen Victoria did not like to travel faster than 40 miles per hour – even though trains at the time were capable of going much faster.

Victoria’s eldest son King Edward VII ordered new carriages and ordered that they were built and furnished in a similar way to cabins on the royal yacht at the time.

The first bath was installed on a train by King George V during World War I when he and his wife, Queen Mary, were regular users of the royal train to get around the country during the war years to boost public morale.

Some of the former royal trains are now kept at the National Railway Museum in York.

No decision has yet been made about where the last royal train will end up after it has carried its final royal passengers.

Source: ITV

- Agencies