While unreserved peak-time travel is absurdly expensive in the UK if you travel off-peak or book far enough in advance it's much less. I used to regularly trave

While unreserved peak-time travel is absurdly expensive in the UK if you travel off-peak or book far enough in advance it's much less. I used to regularly travel between Manchester and London (about the same distance as Liverpool) and it was £200 peak / £60 off peak for walk up return fares. That was 10 years ago. Looking now it's gone up to £370 peak (!) / £95 off peak return. While I did meet one person who regularly flew Manchester/London he lived very close to the airport so it wasn't too much extra hassle for him. It's only 200 miles / 2 hours on the train so the flights were mostly for connecting at Heathrow to international flights. Flights tended to be more popular London/Scotland where you're looking at 4 hours on the train.