The Anonymous Widower

An Open Letter To The Chief Executive Of Gatwick Airport

I am a sixty-eight year old widower, who has recovered fairly well from a serious stroke and who lives alone, a couple of hundred metres from Dalston Junction station, which is just within my walking range with a small wheelie case.

My passion is travel on both trains and planes and I regularly fly somewhere exotic within the EH 111 area, take the trains back across Europe staying in good hotels in the best cities and then write about it in my blog called The Anonymous Widower.

Gatwick is my airport of choice, as getting to Heathrow is difficult from Dalston, as the Piccadilly Line is only for masochists and Paddington was built in the wrong place for the East End.

As a Freedom Pass holder, to get to Gatwick at the present time, I buy a return ticket at the machine at Dalston Junction from the Zone 6 boundary to Gatwick for under a tenner. I then usually go to the Airport with just a single change at the step-free station of New Cross Gate.

Thameslink when it arrives in 2018 will obviously be good news for Gatwick Airport, as it will put millions more people within an hour of the Airport.

That is unless you live along the East London Line. According to the Thameslink web site, there will be no connection between stations from Norwood Junction to New Cross Gate to Thameslink, so to get to the new sewrvice, passengers will have to take alternative arrangements. For me that will mean taking a bus to London Bridge.

On the other hand, I am looking forward to the expansion of your Airport station, as when it is complete, it will mean that getting to see my friends on the South Coast will be easier and your station will probably be my chosen interchange.

That is provided I can get to the Airport easily from the the East London Line.

Those planning Thameslink seem to have forgotten that East London exists.

February 18, 2016 - Posted by | Transport/Travel | , , ,

5 Comments »

  1. You seem to be labouring under the misapprehension that there will be no trains at New Cross Gate after Thameslink. Obviously the pattern will be different, but there will still be 20 or more trains per hour from London Bridge. A look at current services at NXG shows several connections per hour between NXG and Gatwick with one or two direct (and some journeys requiring a change at East Croydon are quicker than direct stoppers).

    You seem to want [fast] Thameslink services to stop at NXG for your convenience. It would probably make more sense for Overground trains to go to East rather than West Croydon or even better proceed to Gatwick. Sadly politics gets in the way here with a mayor who favours Heathrow expansion over a second runway at Gatwick – so is he going to make it easier for your to get to Gatwick?

    Comment by Mark Clayton | February 18, 2016 | Reply

    • Further to last I have now looked at the transfer at New Cross Gate.

      Trains from ELL stop at platform 1 and from London Bridge to Gatwick call at platform 3, however once the Bermondsey Dive under is completed and Thameslink are running on the fast lines they will very likely stop at platform 2, so you will get a cross platform change.

      No such luck the other way Overground trains stop at platform 5, which is on its own.

      Comment by Mark Clayton | February 19, 2016 | Reply

      • My feeling is that there wasn’t enough creative collaborative drinking between the Thameslink and ELL planners. A few cups of tea or coffee would have done wonders, if they didn’t want to try anything stronger..

        Comment by AnonW | February 19, 2016

  2. The Overground goes to West Croydon in an attempt to revitalise the area, when under any logical argument about passengers, they should go to East Croydon or possibly South Croydon.

    Ithink that the ideal service would be trains from both London Bridge and the ELL up to East Croydon, stopping at a pattern that gave good interchange. It would be a feeder to Thameslink. All the slow services should share an island platform at East Croydon with the Thameslink line going the other way.

    No Mayor, incumbent or candidate favours Heathrow expansion and it wil never happen, but Gatwick can start to push for a second runway from 2019.

    Comment by AnonW | February 18, 2016 | Reply

    • Point taken about Boris – got the blond bluffer mixed up with someone else.

      Comment by Mark Clayton | February 18, 2016 | Reply


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