CHARGE points for electric vehicles are coming to Helensburgh Central and Cardross railway stations in the next few weeks.

The first of 50 chargers installed across Scotland are now live, with the remainder set to follow by the end of the year.

The chargers are available to all customers parking at the stations and are free to use.

The first of the charging points, at Uphall, Bathgate, East Kilbride and Johnstone stations, are available to all customers parking at the stations and are free to use.

A complete charge from the 22kW supply will typically take around four hours, twice as fast as “plugging in” at home.

A total of 100 spaces will be created at 50 of the ScotRail Alliance’s station car parks by the end of 2017, joining more than 700 publicly-available charge points across the country.

Joining the chargers are a fleet of four electric vans, which have been leased as part of the ScotRail Alliance’s work to reduce their environmental impact.

The Nissan NV200s replace a number of existing diesel vehicles.

The ScotRail Alliance’s programmes and transformation director, Ian McConnell, told the Advertiser: “These additions to our car parks, combined with longer trains, more seats and better services, will all help us to achieve our aim of reducing the carbon footprint from door to door.”

Rebecca Roper, community manager at ChargePlace Scotland, said: “We are delighted to welcome the new ScotRail Alliance charge points onto the growing ChargePlace Scotland network.

“The addition of these charge points presents the opportunity for greener commuting and travel, and also provides more recharging options at convenient locations for the increasing number of electric vehicles on Scotland’s roads.”