We are renting a car in Edinburgh for a 2 week tour of Scotland, and then we’ll be dropping it off before the next leg of our journey to York and London. We will be taking the train from Edinburgh to York, and spending one night there. Then we are off to London for 3 nights. My question is, are there any car rental places near the train stations? It seems that there are 3 stations in Edinburgh.
Posted by
Northamptonshire, England
32801 posts
Although your question is about Scotland and it is in the England Forum, I have a little info. The station you will be leaving Edinburgh from to travel to York will be from Waverley Station.
Perhaps some familiar with Scotland will spot your question here....
Posted by
San Francisco Bay Area
5697 posts
Did just that a few years ago -- returned the car IN the train station, went off to York on the train.
Ask the rental agency for directions before you select your return location.
Posted by
Paris
9596 posts
Another option is to drop the car at Edinburgh airport, then taking the tram into Edinburgh itself. I found driving in Edinburgh rather daunting (it was August and Festival time, which definitely made it worse).
Posted by
4530 posts
Taking the car to York and dropping it there can make sense, especially if you are visiting Hadrian’s wall or the borderlands anyway. Expect to pay a one way fee. Dropping the car in Edinburgh to coincide with pre-purchased cheap train tickets sounds stressful. And it has to be cheaper ultimately to drop the car in York than to stage dropping it in Edinburgh where you don’t actually want to be.
If “we” is 3-4 people you might as well price out dropping the car north of London (Luton, St Albans, Stevenage) and training into London from there, although that pushes you out of central York w/lodging and requires using the Park and Ride lots.
It also depends on whether your 2 weeks in Scotland is 14 days, or actually 12 or 13 meaning you’ve got days paid for with a 2 week rental that you are forfeiting in your original plan.
A last thought: if visiting Edinburgh is part of this trip, save that till the end so that you are returning the car to where you want to be (ie sleeping there). In that case start your trip with a short drive to a place like Stirling that can be easily reached even with jet lag.
Posted by
OP
26 posts
Thank you, you gave us a lot to think about.
Posted by
SF Bay Area
304 posts
We just did this last July; dropped off the rental car at the main train station in Edinburgh and took a train back to London. Very convenient – except for the drive in downtown Edinburgh! but we survived ;-)
We dropped it off well before noon (our train left at noon) and they were busy; said they'd process it right away. Well, the car didn't get processed until 18:00 and we were charged for an extra day. Grrr. Oh well, these things happen. Since we were catching a train, we couldn't stick around until they processed it.
Posted by
5 posts
I picked up an Enterprise car in Edinburgh and dropped it off at their office outside of the city. I thought I would need to get a taxi to town, but they kindly dropped me off.