the west coast partnership (wcp) is a railway franchise in the united kingdom for passenger trains on the west coast main line (wcml)(and branches thereof), between london euston, the west midlands, shropshire, north wales, liverpool, manchester, carlisle, edinburgh and glasgow. in november 2016, the department for transport (dft) announced that the intercity west coast franchise would be replaced by the west coast partnership, which will operate express services on both the west coast main line (wcml) and on high speed 2 (hs2). [3][4] in june 2017, the dft announced three consortiums had been shortlisted to bid for the franchise:[5][6] in december 2018, mtr announced that spain’s main rail operator renfe operadora had joined its joint bid as a key subcontractor.