As of late Sunday 17th August 2025, the petition to ‘Start a Newcastle – Edinburgh Rail Service via Blyth Bebside and Northumberland Park‘ stands at a fantastic 898 signatures so far.
This shows the continued and increasing support for the route to become established, which hopefully will come soon after the completion of stations in late 2025/early 2026.
The next major milestone for the petition will be 1000 signatures, which will hopefully be reached quite soon, but the petition will remain open until a service is started over the route.
Railtour expected over the Northumberland Coast Loop: 25th August 2025
On Monday 25th August, the ‘The Royal Edinburgh Military Tattoo and Waverley Weekender‘ operated by UK Railtours is expected to run southbound along the Northumberland Coast Loop route.
Starting from Dunbarton, then running through Edinburgh Waverley, and down the East Coast Main Line (ECML), before curving off the mainline at Morpeth North Junction, heading towards Bedlington and then heading south along the Northumberland Line towards Newcastle.
The last railtour over the proposed N.C.L. route (on which I was a passenger), was ‘The Seven Counties Rambler‘ operated by SRPS Railtours on 8th March 2025, with 171 days between these two railtours.
As of yet, exact timings and traction for the UK Railtours train on Monday 25th August is not known, but should be uploaded soon to websites such as Realtime Trains once released, and will also be shared here.
If you can, please try and grab a photograph/video of this railtour (please do so from a position of safety, NEVER trespass on the railway for any reason), and if you’d like them featured/shared on this blog/our social media, please send them via the Facebook page or via X (Twitter).
Thanks, RH.
The Northumberland Coast Loop 