 Avanti West Coast and London Northwestern Railway operate all services on the route.The Trent Valley line was opened in 1847 to give a more direct route from London to the North West of England, bypassing the existing route via Birmingham built by the Grand Junction Railway and the London and Birmingham Railway a decade earlier.The contractor for the of double-track line was the London Railway Contractors Partnership of Thomas Brassey, John Stephenson and William MacKenzie.