Editing Eurostar (section)

===Regional Eurostar and Nightstar===
{{Further|Regional Eurostar |Nightstar (train)}}
[[File:Eurostars at waterloo international.jpg|thumb|A pair of [[British Rail Class 373|Eurostar trains]] at the former [[Waterloo International railway station|Waterloo International]]]]

The original proposals for Eurostar included direct services to Paris and Brussels from cities north of London: [[Manchester Piccadilly railway station|Manchester Piccadilly]] via [[Birmingham New Street railway station|Birmingham New Street]] on the [[West Coast Main Line]] and [[Leeds railway station|Leeds]] and {{rws|Glasgow Central}} via [[Edinburgh Waverley railway station|Edinburgh Waverley]], [[Newcastle railway station|Newcastle]] and {{rws|York}} on the [[East Coast Main Line]].<ref>{{Cite web |date=n.d. |title=Review of regional Eurostar services: summary report |url=http://www.dft.gov.uk/pgr/rail/passenger/europe/reviewofregionaleurostarserv3325?page=10 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20101214082434/http://dft.gov.uk/pgr/rail/passenger/europe/reviewofregionaleurostarserv3325?page=10 |archive-date=14 December 2010 |publisher=[[Department for Transport]]}}</ref>

Seven 14-coach "North of London" Eurostar trains for these [[Regional Eurostar]] services were built, but these services never came to fruition. Predicted journey times of almost nine hours for Glasgow to Paris at the time of growth of low-cost air travel during the 1990s made the plans commercially unviable against the cheaper and quicker airlines.<ref>{{Cite news |date=28 April 1999 |title=Eurostar extension in doubt |work=BBC News |url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/the_economy/330888.stm |access-date=31 December 2007 |archive-date=25 September 2003 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20030925102628/http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/the_economy/330888.stm |url-status=live }}</ref> Other reasons that have been suggested for these services having never been run were both government policies and the disruptive [[privatisation of British Rail]].<ref name="regionfail">{{Cite journal |last1=Knowles |first1=Richard |last2=Farrington |first2=John |date=December 1998 |title=Why Has the Market Not Been Created for Channel Tunnel Regional Passenger Rail Services? |journal=Area |publisher=Royal Geographical Society |volume=30 |issue=4 |pages=359–366 |doi=10.1111/j.1475-4762.1998.tb00080.x |jstor=20003928|bibcode=1998Area...30..359K }}</ref> Three of the Regional Eurostar units were leased by [[Great North Eastern Railway]] (GNER) to increase domestic services from [[London King's Cross railway station|London King's Cross]] to York and later Leeds.<ref>{{Cite news |date=16 January 2002 |title=High-speed GNER trains scrapped |work=BBC News |url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/1763438.stm |access-date=10 May 2009 |archive-date=28 May 2009 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090528180636/http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/1763438.stm |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{cite magazine |title= White Rose to run to Leeds with extra trains |magazine=[[Rail Magazine]] |issue=428 |date=6 February 2002 |page=16}}</ref> The lease expired in December 2005, and most of the North of London sets were transferred to [[SNCF]] for [[TGV]] services in northern France.<ref name="CTRLrailtec">{{Cite web |date=n.d. |title=Channel Tunnel Rail Link (CTRL), United Kingdom |url=http://www.railway-technology.com/projects/chunnel/ |access-date=11 May 2009 |publisher=Railway-technology-com |archive-date=26 January 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210126030956/https://www.railway-technology.com/projects/chunnel/ |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{cite magazine |title= SNCF prepares to use Eurostar sets |magazine=[[Today's Railways UK]] |issue=64 |date=April 2007 |page=68}}</ref>

An international [[Nightstar (train)|Nightstar]] sleeper train was also planned; this would have travelled the same routes as Regional Eurostar, plus the [[Great Western Main Line]] to {{rws|Cardiff Central}}.<ref>{{Cite news |last=Guerra |first=Michael |date=December 2003 |title=Second chance for Eurostar sleepers |pages=10–11 |work=Railwatch |publisher=RailFuture |issue=93 |url=http://www.railwatch.org.uk/backtrack/rw098/rw098p10.pdf |url-status=dead |access-date=28 April 2009 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090620081753/http://www.railwatch.org.uk/backtrack/rw098/rw098p10.pdf |archive-date=20 June 2009}}</ref> These were also deemed commercially unviable, and the scheme was abandoned with no services ever operated. In 2000, the coaches were sold to [[Via Rail]] in Canada.<ref>{{Cite news |last=Middleton |first=William D. |date=August 2003 |title=Via Rail's renaissance: "Renaissance" is the name Via Rail Canada has given its new fleet of European-built passenger cars, but it applies equally well to the entire operation |work=[[Railway Age]] |location=New York |url=http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1215/is_8_204/ai_108114496/pg_2/?tag=content;col1 |access-date=19 June 2009}}{{dead link|date=May 2017 |bot=InternetArchiveBot |fix-attempted=yes }}</ref><ref>{{Cite news |last=Hickling |first=Michael |date=1 November 2007 |title=Fast track to Europe – old track to Yorkshire |work=Yorkshire Post |location=Leeds |url=http://www.yorkshirepost.co.uk/features/Fast-track-to-Europe-.3439321.jp |access-date=10 May 2009 |archive-date=5 August 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200805231331/https://www.yorkshirepost.co.uk/features/Fast-track-to-Europe-.3439321.jp |url-status=live }}</ref>