Bosses at ScotRail have issued a stark warning to passengers ahead of three days of strike action this week.
Drivers will walk out tomorrow, with further days of action scheduled for Thursday and Saturday.
Only five services will run across the entire country — none of them in Ayrshire — during the strike.
It follows the failure of a last ditch attempt to resolve the dispute today.
UK Government chiefs said negotiations were for unions and employers, and refused to wade into the row which will see 13 train operators crippled.
Severely reduced services will now run across the UK, with many routes not running at all.
ScotRail has urged customers to only travel "if they really need to" with extremely limited trains running on their network.
Ayrshire will not be covered at all with services restricted to the central belt.
The five lines which are running are as follows.
- Edinburgh – Glasgow via Falkirk High: two trains per hour
- Edinburgh – Bathgate: two trains per hour
- Glasgow – Hamilton/Larkhall: two trains per hour
- Glasgow – Lanark: two trains per hour
- Edinburgh – Glasgow via Shotts: one train per hour
Trains will run between 07.30am and 6.30pm, with ScotRail warning that the trains will depart their station well before services terminate.
The strikes will not impact ScotRail staff, however Network Rail staff who are RMT members will take industrial action.
There may be further disruption on the days following strike action which are 22, 24, and 26 June because of the reopening of signal boxes at different times across the day.
David Simpson, ScotRail service delivery director, said: “It is very unfortunate to see such widespread disruption across the whole of the Great Britain rail network and we know this will be frustrating for ScotRail customers.
“Regrettably, this strike action by RMT members of Network Rail means that we will not be able to operate the vast majority of our services during the period of strike action.
“We’re reminding customers to expect significant disruption to services this week, including on the days between, and following, strike action which will impact customers travelling to events across the country.
“On the five routes where we are able to operate a very limited service on strike days, we’re urging customers to only travel if they really need to, and to seek alternative means of transport where possible.”
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