We may have our ELL trains extended to Highbury and Islington from Sunday 28th February. LOROL are testing trains on the new extension between Dalston and H&I.

Once opened it'll give us connections with the Victoria Line, LO's North London Line and First Capital Connect services to Moorgate, Old Street, Finsbury Park, Stevenage and Welwyn Garden City.

Hello there,

Purely selfish question here, but any help would be greatly appreciated.

We currently live in Peckham Rye, and I commute using the 8.01 or 8.16 First Capital Connect service into City Thameslink.

At that time of day, is it a real squeeze getting onto the London Bridge trains (from HOP)? or is it OK? - and how often do they run around that time?

Many thanks

funnily enough there is a 8.01 to London Bridge which isnt too crowded however the follow on journey from LB can be very crowded.

trains are fairly frequent plus the overground, it all depends where you work. if its near city thameslink then your current journey is probably the best one

Thanks for the quick reply. I'll prob walk from London Bridge (or get the 521 bus onward when not fair weather) - the walk will do me good and will take 15/20 mins through Borough Market and along the river.

I work about a minute away from City Thameslink - so yes the current commute is a dream...

Peckham Rye is a great place and has good links - but its the prices to get a family house with a decent garden / primary schools that are the swing factor for us.

The walk from LB to City Thames Link used to take me about 12 to 15 minutes on a good day, as you said the 521 is good for bad weather.

The other option would be to get the train to City Thameslink from Crofton Park direct.

If it is part of a move its worth considering that in 2018 hop should get through trains to city thameslink as part of the thamesllink project.

In the meantime crofton park is a good option however does not get as many trains.

Thanks - never thought about Crofton Park...

It's only two stops past Peckham Rye, so a slightly earlier commute should do it.

I work close to Farringdon station and take use the train from Crofton Park. The journey to City Thamesling takes approximately 20 mins. I try to catch the 7.59 train and nearly always get a seat.

Howden, why not get on an Overground train (8 tph from HOP) and get out and walk from one of the Eastern or Northern City stations. They are only crowded as far as Canada Water.

Thanks for all the tips. Very useful.

I see this thread generally appears lower down the page these days.

Is this a sign that the introduction of the LO and the changes to Southern services have generally improved this for those travelling from Honor Oak Park/Forest Hill stations?

I'd be very interested in hearing from those for whom the changes have meanttheir experiences have worsened.

In hindsight, I can't believe we put up with the old service for so long. Yes we had more trains to London Bridge in those days, but the wait of 10 minutes meant that you had to go at a specific time.

In 2011, (for the majority of the day) I just turn up at FH, wait no more than 4/5 mins for a train going northbound and that's it.

Being part of the Overground network has made it so much easier to get around town compared to pre May 2010 and as we'll see tomorrow with the extension to Highbury and Islington opening, north and east London seem a lot more nearer than what we had before.

Last Thursday I noticed that two trains stopped at New Cross Gate at approximately the same time.

Does anyone know if there is any advantage in taking the ELL to New Cross Gate and waiting for the normal train there?

I've just been reading through the London TravelWatch response to the London and South East Route Utilisation Strategy. It contains a few recommendations that will be of interest to passengers on the Forest Hill line:

* Brockley Station interchange with services into Victoria (p23)
* More services via Crofton Park (p35)
* Early extension of the Bakerloo line further into South East London to provide additional capacity (p46)
* The extension of the Bakerloo line would also potentially enable the regeneration of the area around Bricklayers Arms (p22)

An extension via 'Bricklayers Arms' could either follow the A2 to Lewisham (made less useful if the DLR is extended beyond Lewisham), it could go to Greenwich, or it could follow the 63 bus route to Honor Oak.

Meanwhile, Passenger Focus want further consideration to be given to the Bakerloo line going to Herne Hill.

Network Rail expects to publish the final RUS in summer 2011.

Good news: Oyster Extension Permits will no longer be required after 22 May 2011. Received this e-mail from TfL yesterday:

"I am writing to let you know that from Sunday 22 May, Oyster Extension Permits will no longer be required.

In future, when you use a Travelcard and Oyster pay as you go together on National Rail services in Greater London, just touch in and touch out for every journey you make to ensure you pay the correct fare.

Please make sure you have sufficient pay as you go credit on your Oyster card before starting your journey."

Great news. It's been a crazy situation where if you had a Travelcard for example 1-4 and wanted to travel to Croydon, you could just use your PAYG if you travelled to West Croydon on London Overground, but if you went to East on Southern, you had to put an OEP on in addition to your PAYG.

The OEP was one of the conditions that got the National Rail TOC's to approve Oyster PAYG on their services, but once they realised that Oyster has increased revenue, they decided to drop the OEPs. It was also a bugbear for the Revenue Protection Officers (ticket inspectors).

Southern Railways have confirmed that they intend to start running 10 carriage trains through Forest Hill from this December.
I doubt all trains will be 10 carriages, but at least some will be during the peak period (hopefully most). Before this happens Network Raill need to do some minor platform lengthening, so we should be seeing work beginning soon.

This could increase peak capacity on our line by up to 14% (taking account of Southern and ELL trains). The downside is that when work begins at London Bridge to accomodate Thameslink (from 2013) we are likely to see a temporary reduction in the number of trains going to LB via FH.

Sorry if this has been covered before at any point - but does anyone know whether there are any plans to allow Thameslink trains to stop at FH or anywhere local down our neck of the woods in the future?

Thanks!