Stagecoach will run the routes for seven years

Nottingham City Council is worried that rail services to London will not be fast enough when East Midlands Trains takes over next month.

The new operator has insisted its new timetable will be an improvement and is still open to public consultation.

Most trains take two hours to get to London, especially at peak times, city spokesman Stephen Barker said.

Mr Barker said the two-hour journey from Nottingham to London is not good enough.

It seems the company has decided that the Nottingham route will have all the stops Stephen Barker, Nottingham City Council

"It will soon take several hours to get to Paris from London (on Eurostar) so It seems ridiculous that it will take two hours to get to London from Nottingham," he said.

"Nottingham is a core city and a driver of the regional economy and we need fast connections to London.

"It seems the company has decided that the Nottingham route will have all the stops. The Derby and Sheffield trains are 10 minutes faster between Leicester and London than the Nottingham trains are."

A spokesman for East Midlands Trains said: "In the morning the train service isn't any worse and in the evening we are speeding up the journeys between London and Nottingham."

East Midlands Trains has promised faster journeys to Sheffield - just over two hours - and Leicester just over one hour from London as part of a new timetable being introduced in December 2008.

It is also planning additional early morning trains from Derby to cater for morning peak demand and a new daily direct service between London and Lincoln.