City Thameslink station

Just another marketing buzzword gone stale.
Some overblown wideboy on public money no doubt dreamned up 'Thameslink' as a 'go-ahead new concept' in 'trans-urban pssenger movement' for the new (add era here)'.
It basically segregates itself from the rest of the Underground system.
How useful!

Indeed - it should be on the Tube map. And called Crossrail 0 (or Crossrail could be Thameslink 2 - it follows the river quite closely for much of its length, and crosses it more often than Thameslink 1 does!)

I recall reading somewhere that the impetus for the change was confusion between the locations by people calling the emergency services. Although why this is not an issue for Shepherd's Bush, Hammersmith, Edgware Road, etc. I don't know.

I fear you are displaying an outstanding level of ignorance here, Thameslink has never had any association with the London Underground system or TfL which is why it does not appear in the context of TfL services (including the Overground). Morover it was NOT the result of some sort of revolutionary cross city travel concept.

'Thameslink' is a sub-brand created by British Rail's "Network SouthEast" division - along with similar sub-brands such as 'Sussex Coast', 'South London Limes', Kent Coast', 'Kent Link' 'West Anglia', 'Great Eastern' 'West Of England', Thames', Chiltern', etc. It had absolutely nothing to do with London Underground or any part of London Government. The name 'Thameslink was meant to signify the linking of two previously separate groups of rail services (although Holborn Viaduct, Charing Cross, Cannon Street etc are all on the north bank of the Thames, they have always been exclusively associated with train services heading to places on or beyond the south bank of said river) so the name is still a perfectly reasonable one.

Thameslink was set up by the then nationalised British Rail back in the late 1980s - and although the cross London element, was much publicised, that aspect of the scheme had, in fact, very little to do with why the scheme got funded in the first place...

The original submission for funds to the BR board in fact was based on a far more mundane thing - namely a significant increase in stock utilisation due to trains working through the core rather than sitting round at London termini, plus the opportunity to give the Brighton main line its first powered door EMU stock in its life, plus the displaced 25KV only EMUs operating out to Bedford being able to be cascaded to displace further slam door EMUs operating out of Kings Cross etc. Furthermore British Rail deliberately made sure Thameslink served destinations a considerable distance from London precisely because (i) this gave the optimum result as regards stock utilisation but also (ii) in revenue terms thanks to the high season ticket returns generated by season ticket holders from the likes of Brighton and Bedford.

There was also the fairly big carrot of the potential ability to sell off the extremely valuable (in property terms) Holborn Viaduct station site (only served in peak hours) for redevelopment if the scheme was a success.

In short Thameslinks original business case was nothing remotely like that for Crossrail (as the later came to be constructed*) with completely different objectives / outcomes - and that was before the big cutback of Thameslink routes like Guildford and Sevenoaks that occurred in 1992 when British Rails NSE division effectively ditched Thameslink services within the South London, preferring to focus on commuters from Sussex & the MML to generate revenues.

Given Thameslink was a wholly owned and BR operated train service London Underground had no obligation to include it on their publicity. The fact that LU did indeed tend to include it on most of their maps in the the late 80s / early 90s was only down to them - and it pretty much stopped when BR was privatised, a situation TfL seem more than happy with to this day.

As such while on a 'National Rail' map Thameslink might look a bit like a 'Crossrail 0' the truth is very different and it would be a mistake to try confuse the two brands in such a way. In fact with the redevelopment of St Pancrass only giving 4 platforms for the Midland main line to use, with London Bridge only having 6 terminal platforms and with the new Bermondsey flyover connecting the fast lines towards Croydon directly into Thameslink, is impossible to have Thameslink be anything other than a ordinary national rail TOC, with lots of destinations a considerable distance from London optimised to brining long distance commuters into the city.. Conversley way Crossrail has been set up to deliver a very high frequency to 4 destinations all within or fairly close to the GLA area precludes it being expanded to a Thameslink style setup (which could in theory have seen Oxford, Southend, Colchester, Gillingham, etc be directly served by cross London services)

* Crossrail makes it clear (not least from the specification of its trains) that it sees itself as simply a glorified tube line (and thus fits in nicely with TfLs other rail services) - as opposed to Thameslink which sees itself as transporting commuters long distances from the Home Counties into the City.

A key element of it was actually built by the Metropolitan Railway!



I am well aware of the business case that led to Thameslink but, like it or not, it provides useful cross-London links.

It is misleading to omit Thameslink from the Tube map unless you see the map as primarily a flag-waving exercise in corporate aggrandisement rather than as a practical guide for travellers - especially since TfL fares apply throughout the core. Does it really help anyone arriving at Kings Cross and wanting to visit the Tate Modern, for example, to be led to believe the most direct way there is via Green Park to Southwark, followed by a trek up Blackfriars Bridge Road? It is equally nonsensical to omit the Northern City Line from the map simply because it is no longer part of the Underground.

In my view all NR lines in Zones 1 and 2 with a decent service frequency should appear on the Tube map.

(We see similar nonsenses with some of the TOCs' publicity - Cross Country's famous map which suggested to get from Leeds to Manchester you had to go via Birmingham!)

But the two never co-existed!

Yes it was built and Owned by the Metropolitan Railway, but by the time someone came up with the brand 'Thameslink' said line was maintained, signalled and regarded as British Rail infrastructure, not LU -though LU may of course still own the freehold (or whatever the correct legal term is) the trackbed sits on)