Govia trains, which includes
Southern, have now opened its second and final
consultation phase for its proposed timetable for
beyond Dec 2018, which will be the first time
travellers can enjoy the benefits of the major
rail investment, including the seven year project
to rebuild London Bridge.
There are some useful
improvements, such as an earlier first Victoria
train and a second morning peak to London Bridge.
Epsom residents should be very
pleased as they will see an enhanced and improved
service, with new, twice hourly trains direct to
London Bridge. Southern note that this “in
response to strong stakeholder representation…..We
expect these [routes] to be very busy”.
However, it is a different
story for commuters in Mole Valley who will see a
significant diminution in the evening peak from
London Bridge with the axing of almost all direct
trains.
Currently, from 1800, there
are three direct train services departing from
London Bridge for Mole Valley (1803, 1832 and
1929). These trains call at Ashtead, Leatherhead
and either Dorking or Guildford. These trains are
very busy, yet they have all been axed. In
future, a re-timed service will go as far as only
Epsom. This can’t be a capacity issue at London
Bridge so why are they being abolished?
This is clearly a retrograde
and divisive step. Mole Valley residents are
having one of their three arterial routes
downgraded whilst Epsom residents see theirs
improved. We have all put up with the disruption
while the London Bridge project has been underway,
now we should all be sharing in the benefits.
The proposed changes will
cause significant inconvenience and extend journey
times to many hundreds of Mole Valley commuters.
Commuting to London is already a long ordeal,
please don’t allow Govia/Southern to make it even
harder for us especially as this is being billed
as an improvement.
The good news is that is still
time for ARA and all of us to make strong and
immediate representations to Govia/Southern not to
axe the three directs trains in its proposed
timetable, but we need to be quick. Their
consultation window only opened 26 June and closes
27 July 2017. This consultation is for “fine
tuning” so please let Southern know that Mole
Valley commuters value and want to save their
evening peak trains.
Comments can be submitted to gtr.timetableconsultation@gtrailway.com
Please do respond or else we
will certainly lose the route.
Above
is a summary and links to supporting documentation
are below.
Existing timetable: http://www.southernrailway.com/your-journey/plan-your-journey/timetables/
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