A pioneering partnership

Welcome to the West Coast Partnership franchise owned by First Trenitalia, a joint venture between FirstGroup and Trenitalia.

West Coast Partnership comprises two distinct parts – Avanti West Coast and West Coast Partnership Development. Both will work in partnership with stakeholders, communities and customers along the route to develop and enhance rail services and help stimulate economic growth.

We’ll be travelling the length of the country over the coming years, and we couldn’t be prouder to be setting off on the journey together.

Pulling together

At FirstGroup and Trenitalia, we share a passion for driving the West Coast rail experience forward. We’re bringing together our skills and experience to create a ground-breaking new franchise.

We’re on the brink of an exciting new era of high-speed rail. Our customers want a railway based on partnership. So we’re working with them and our own partners to pioneer a railway with exceptional service as standard. We’ll have more trains running on our network so that we can take more people where they want to go.

We’re giving our customers and stakeholders a voice in shaping the future of today’s railway, and tomorrow’s high-speed trains. To do that, we’ve set up stakeholder advisory boards and customer panels with independent chairs.

Strength in numbers

West Coast Partnership Development is in safe hands with the expertise and knowledge from Trenitalia and FirstGroup. Trenitalia has extensive experience planning, launching and running high-speed rail services. FirstGroup truly understands the ins and outs of running rail services in the UK and is an expert when it comes to launching new fleets, upgrading timetables and keeping things running smoothly during major infrastructure work.

We’re working with our industry colleagues, especially at HS2 Ltd and Network Rail, to bring high-speed services to our customers over the next ten years.

We are:

• pooling our skills and expertise for all aspects of the planning process – from the specialities of high speed to commercial, programme management and rail technical disciplines
• managing our costs and getting good value for money with expert financial management and procurement
• supporting our partners with constructive advice and offering answers, not problems – as an objective ‘critical friend’ and enthusiastic partner.

As we build a strong partnership with the DfT and HS2 Ltd, together we can really tap into the benefits of this huge investment in the railways.