Night Riviera

The Night Riviera (Cornish: Koskador Ruvyer an Nos) is a sleeper train operated by Great Western Railway (GWR). It is one of only two sleeper services on the railway in the United Kingdom (the other being the Caledonian Sleeper services between London and Scotland). The Night Riviera runs six nights a week (Sunday–Friday) between London Paddington and Penzance with one train in each direction.

The first sleeping car train on the Great Western Railway was introduced at the end of 1877 from London Paddington to Plymouth. This had 7 ft (2,134 mm) broad gauge carriages with two dormitories, one with seven gentlemen's berths and the other with four ladies' berths. These were replaced in 1881 by new carriages with six individual compartments.

An additional service was soon added from London to Penzance which eventually became known as the Night Riviera. In 1920, the two trains left London at 22:00 for Penzance and midnight for Plymouth; by 1947, they had been brought forward to 21:50 and 23:50. Under British Rail sleeping cars were limited to just the Penzance service, although sleeping cars were detached from the Penzance service at Plymouth until 2006.

On 22 December 1945 at 00:45, the sleeper service from Paddington collided with the back of the 23.00 train from Paddington near Sonning. The engine of the sleeper service was derailed and it and four parcel vans on the rear of the 23.00 service were badly damaged.

On 5 July 1978, the up train left Penzance at 21:30. Approaching Taunton early the next morning, the emergency brake was activated and it came to a stand short of the station with one of the carriages on fire. This had been caused by dirty linen that had been placed near a heater, which had been a standard and safe practice before the recent change from steam to electric heating. Twelve people died and thirteen were injured.

On 11 July 1983 the Penzance sleeper was relaunched as the Night Riviera, designed to complement the long-established daytime Cornish Riviera. New Mark 3 air-conditioned sleeping cars were introduced with many safety features that had been lacking in the Mark 1 sleeping car that had caught fire at Taunton. These were the first on the route with controlled emission toilets, so discharge facilities were provided at Plymouth Laira and Penzance Long Rock depots where the carriages were serviced, although for a while the carriages were taken from Paddington to Willesden Depot for discharging as Old Oak Common was not initially equipped. A new pricing scheme was also introduced. Instead of paying a sleeping berth supplement on top of the fare for the journey, all-inclusive fares were introduced that were set at competitive rates. The seating carriages that formed part of the train were mainly Mark 2 carriages. The train by now was again leaving London at midnight, shown in the timetables as 23:59.

On 23 November 1983, the Night Riviera derailed on approach to London Paddington with locomotive 50041 sliding for 100 metres on its side. There were no casualties.

Privatisation saw the service become part of the Great Western Trains franchise in February 1996 and the rolling stock was repainted into its green and white livery. Between 29 May 1995 and 26 September 1998 the service was diverted to London Waterloo to provide connection with Eurostar services. In December 1998 Great Western Trains was rebranded First Great Western.