BR Mark 3 Carriages

British Railways Mark 3 Carriage

The British Rail Mark 3 is a type of passenger carriage developed in response to growing competition from airlines and the car in the 1970s. A variant of the Mark 3 became the rolling stock for the High Speed Train (HST).

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Originally conceived as locomotive-hauled coaching stock, the first coaches built were for the prototype HST in 1972. Production coaches entered service between 1975 and 1988, and multiple-unit designs based on the Mark 3 bodyshell continued to be built until the early 1990s. Most of the surviving fleet of the Mark 3 and its derivatives were still in revenue service on the British railway network.

Under the chairmanship of Stanley Raymond, it was decided to reduce journey times further on long-distance trains by increasing line speed to 125 mph (200 km/h), where practical – the maximum considered possible on Britain's Victorian-age railways. At the end of 1968, proposals were submitted to the Commercial and Operating Departments of British Rail for a new fleet of third-generation standard coaching stock, designed to run at 125 mph.

Mark 3 Carriages at the MNR

At present there are 32 Mark 3 carriages on site, with the MNR owning 25 of these.