Following your and other complaints, I met with representatives from both Southern and Southeastern to discuss the changes in Southern’s services, which affect New Cross Gate, Brockley and Honor Oak stations.

We had a long and detailed discussion about rail timetabling and the capacity at London Bridge. Unfortunately the companies remain adamant that here is no capacity to run Southern services through London Bride and on to Charing Cross. I know this will be a disappointment to you and I am sorry that there appears to be no way through the timetabling in this regard.

I then discussed the changes to the timetable due to take effect in May. I spent a long time asking questions about the logistics and justification behind this, however the operators are convinced that they are unable to run 6 stopping trains an hour in the evening peak. They say this is due to the longer spread of the evening peak compared to the morning peak; platform availability in the evening and the additional 8 trains an hour passing through the stations on the extended East London Line.

It is a reality that the extension of the East London Line does place restrictions on timetabling. 8 trains an hour will be running on the track, providing the East London Line service and the minimum spacing of trains for safety reasons is 3 minutes apart.

I have asked them to look at this further – even one extra train would be worth having. I asked (and they agreed) that there should be careful monitoring of the service with a rolling review and another meeting with me in July. There is no guarantee of any positive change but I am keen to hear from constituents of the effect of the change when introduced.

I am also keen to hear from anyone who thinks there may be any solutions to these problems not already explored.

I know that one of the chief concerns about the changes to the evening peak service is the issue of overcrowding on the trains. Southern have assured me that from May all evening peak trains leaving London Bridge along the ’stopping line’ will be 8 coach trains, whereas presently some are not. I have sought assurances from Southern that they will carefully monitor the numbers of passengers who ‘switch’ to the East London Line and the express service and those who continue to use the services that stop at New Cross Gate, Brockley and Honor Oak Park.

You may also be interested to know (although it is still some time off) work will be starting shortly to extend platforms at some stations in order to have 10 car trains running from mid-2012.