Changes

[Ameecher]

They could operate it now though using dual-voltage stock. The track is all there and electrified I believe.

Airtrack would connect Heathrow to Staines, which is about 50 minutes from Reading. It would be pointless to connect with Gatwick since 1. trains would have to reverse somewhere near to Reading, and 2. the journey time would be longer than the coach.

The idea of airtrack is to improve the infrastructure to make it possible. Currently the lines around London are too busy to make it worth while and to get regular timings. Also the whole scheme would see a new tunnel leave Heathrow from the South rather than the current from the North.

[JamieLei]

Nonetheless, if it did occur, it would be pointless to connect with Gatwick. The journey times around that area of London on the Reading "fasts" which I use to get to my second-cousin's house are actually ridiculously slow. It would be nice to link up with Reading but it would just be so slow I don't know if it would be viable. What would be far more useful would be another chord at Airport Junction to allow Reading - Heathrow movements from the GWML.

[Ameecher]

It would be nice to link up with Reading but it would just be so slow I don't know if it would be viable. What would be far more useful would be another chord at Airport Junction to allow Reading - Heathrow movements from the GWML.

Also part of Airtrack, if not Crossrail which seems BAA seems to keen to get to serve the airport.

[Kevo00]

But the coaches aren't carrying transfer passengers (99% of them aren't). All the Gatwick people from up north would be forced to disembark, grab their airline baggage, trawl to the station, get on the train, etc, when the coach could simply take them all straight there. I'd imagine the number of people transferring between Heathrow and Gatwick is very low, making such a proposal pretty useless. The official BAA advice is to catch the HEX, take a taxi across Zone 1, then catch the GatEX. It would probably be cheaper to take a taxi between the two airports in the first place!

Secondly, Gatwick Airport station is mainly used by commuters, serving Crawly, Horley, and to a lesser extent, Hayward's Heath. A great deal of GatEX commuters are actually commuters, the premium price reflecting the fact you can actually get a seat (the journey time is only 3 mins faster than Southern).

Maybe I'm wrong about linking the two airports by rail...

But have you actually carried out properly socially scientific studies to make these claims? How do you know what the intentions of most Gatwick Express travelers are? Just curious as to how you can make these points so assertively without any evidence.

[JamieLei]

But have you actually carried out properly socially scientific studies to make these claims? How do you know what the intentions of most Gatwick Express travelers are? Just curious as to how you can make these points so assertively without any evidence.

The majority of Gatwick Express travellers are most probably airport users. However there are significant numbers of commuters using the service (as interviewed here) http://news.bbc.co.uk/player/nol/newsid ... =1&bbcws=1

There is no way that the airport would induce the 11.9 million people that use the station per year, considering it handles 35 million per year. I sincerely doubt 1 in 3 people travel to the airport by train. At current, only 35% of airport users get there by public transport, which include coaches.

[Ameecher]

I suspect that a lot of people using Gatport Airwick as a commuter station are actually trying to save a bit of time on their journey since the Arundel line services are deathly slow, and also save money on their season ticket. After all, Gatwick is closer to the capital than the surrounding stations. Also, Gatwick has more oppurtunity of trains.

Gatwick Express (unlike HEx and HConnect) is almost solely used by the foreigners who "don't know any better" because airlines provide through tickets on GatEx and which sounds more appealling? "Express" or First Capital Connect/Southern? Only the people in the know avoid the high prices and go with the other two TOCs. Heathrow is obviously different because it's HEx/Connect or the Piccadilly. And Connect is barely used because it's not advertised at Paddington as going to the airport and at the airport it's not advertised as going to Paddington.

[JamieLei]

Gatwick Express (unlike HEx and HConnect) is almost solely used by the foreigners who "don't know any better" because airlines provide through tickets on GatEx and which sounds more appealling? "Express" or First Capital Connect/Southern? Only the people in the know avoid the high prices and go with the other two TOCs. Heathrow is obviously different because it's HEx/Connect or the Piccadilly. And Connect is barely used because it's not advertised at Paddington as going to the airport and at the airport it's not advertised as going to Paddington.

Haha - don't believe Wikipedia - I was at Paddington the over the summer, and Connect services are clearly shown with destination "Heathrow Terminal 5" but with "This is not the express service" written on the last line. Connect is actually well used because it's advertised all the time on the side of London buses, and used to have dual advertising with tkts: "Smart Londoners never pay full price for theatre tickets, Smart Londoners never pay full price to get to the airport". Nonetheless it is essentially a suburban service with the airport bit tagged on at the end.

On the line maps inside trains, Victoria, Blackfriars, Farringdon, Kings Cross and Clapham Junction are all designated with "Trains to Gatwick" so there's no preference apart from the GatEX's own advertising. Southern do their own advertising for their services at Victoria and Gatwick showing the savings to be made aswell. Obviously there's no difference in price between Southern and FCC since fares to London Terminals are the same. Interesingly, the Anytime day return fare for Not GatEX is only 70p more expensive than the Off-Peak Day Return...

What I find funny about the GatEX is that it's only a few minutes faster than the Southern service. It doesn't travel any faster, and only stops at two less stations. The trains are not any longer, and probably don't contain any more legroom than the long-distance Southern 377s. The only advantage I can see with it for commuters is being able to purchase a ticket on the train and the actual possibility of a seat (many Brighton services are standing right from Brighton).

[Ameecher]

Gatwick Express (unlike HEx and HConnect) is almost solely used by the foreigners who "don't know any better" because airlines provide through tickets on GatEx and which sounds more appealling? "Express" or First Capital Connect/Southern? Only the people in the know avoid the high prices and go with the other two TOCs. Heathrow is obviously different because it's HEx/Connect or the Piccadilly. And Connect is barely used because it's not advertised at Paddington as going to the airport and at the airport it's not advertised as going to Paddington.

Haha - don't believe Wikipedia

I didn't, that was the case last time I was at Paddington, it appears, however, to have changed.

As for Gatwick being advertised on trains. I'm not saying it wasn't but how many people arriving in the UK for the first time with a hotel booked in London have seen a mainline rail map of the UK? They want to have their ticket sorted to their hotel BEFORE they even leave. The Gatwick Airport website puts a huge emphasis on the Gatwick Express service providing far more information about it than the competing services on the line even though Southern actually now run GatEx.

[JamieLei]

I'd imagine most people would buy their ticket on the day, even if they'd booked in advance. Thus they can still be persuaded to buy the cheaper Southern ticket.

At Heathrow I think it's more evident, as signs are deliberately giving preference to the HeX with "Trains to London", whereas there seem to be a shortage of signs that point towards the Underground. But as you said, they own the HeX (and the track) and thus have full incentive to trick people onto it. My unfortunate uncle staggered off a plane from Singapore this summer, went to the "Trains to London" counter, bought a HeX ticket and boarded the Connect train. He only found out when the conductor came round and told him he was paying too much!

[Ameecher]

I'd imagine most people would buy their ticket on the day, even if they'd booked in advance. Thus they can still be persuaded to buy the cheaper Southern ticket.

Again, anything to back this up? I certainly like to know, especially after a long flight that I don't have to worry about anything at the other end and can just go. With airlines offering through tickets on GatEx there is further incentive to go with GatEx.

As it happens though, Searching "trains from Gatwick to London" in Google, the first 3 results are advertised links. 1) is FCC, 2) is GatEx and 3) is National Express coaches!
There goes my argument because the first 2 "proper" results are londontoolkit.com advising people how to get to London cheaply. I know that if I could afford it (ie, money was no object) I'd rather get GatEx, though.

[Kevo00]

Surely FCC to London Bridge is much better for a lot of travelers anyway, than going to Victoria, which is not too well placed for the business end of things. Plus a lot of cheaper accommodation is around London Bridge/East End these days.

[Dave]

If you're going to somewhere just outside of Paris, and you know nothing about trains, which would you be more likely to catch - the fancy-sounding TGV or something sounding as boring and s*** as Premiere Capitale Connecte?

Put yourself in the position of the foreigner travelling in - you'd get the quick service. For a start you're on holiday, you're meant to be fleeced!

[orudge]

Re: connecting between Gatwick and Heathrow. Urgh. If I'm flying somewhere from Heathrow, I specifically search for flights from Edinburgh that go to Heathrow, rather than Gatwick, since I really don't want the hassle of changing airports. Thankfully, BA at least, and a couple of other airlines, do run shuttles to both Heathrow and Gatwick.

Re: travelling to Gatwick or Heathrow via rail. Either way, I have to go into the centre of London and change via the Tube (I did Leuchars -> Euston, then tube to Victoria, then Gatwick Express to get to Gatwick, and I did Heathrow -> tube -> King's Cross -> Leuchars another time when flying back via Heathrow), so, eh. It's a lot easier for me to get the train to Edinburgh and then simply fly down.

[andel]

The idea of a shuttle between Heathrow and Gatport Airwick is an old one but it would be a fantastic benefit, not just to the people who need to transfer but for the additional benefits of moving passengers from A to B without the need of Customs Control simply by dedicating a couple of carriages with a lock-out to Transfer Passengers... at the moment, they have to use a dedicated transfer coach and go through customs.

There has been mooted ideas of linking them using a MagLev or Monorail... but lets face it - it won't happen in quite a while...

Nuff said for now - dinner to be had.

[JamieLei]

All UK passengers have to clear customs, whether or not they're leaving the airport or simply transferring at the same airport. Passengers would still have to clear customs to get on an "airside" bus, although their baggage would presumably be taken straight there.

A Heathrow-Gatwick service could actually be of great use by enabling the two airports to work as one. It would also prevent the wastage such as BA flying from Edinburgh to both Heathrow and Gatwick to enable passengers to use all the connecting flights. But the journey time between the two might too great for this to work effectively.

[EXTspotter]

O+D = Origin and Destination. It means that at gatwick for instance, the passengers that use it are almost all using it as their Origin or Final Destination, however, many more people use heathrow to connect through, so the percentage of O+D passengers is lower, even though the physical number of O+D passenger is greater at Heathrow, than at Gatwick, but because at gatwick, of the 35m passengers p.a., around 500,000 are connecting, the rest being O+D, and at Heathrow, of the 68m Passengers, about 20m are connecting passengers, with the other 50m or so being O+D. Does that clarify things - I should have remembered that I was on tt-f and not a.net where you get flamed for using bad terminology

[Ameecher]

There's nothing wrong with using such terminology, just define it*. With the definition of "O+D" your original post now makes sense.

*You see in newspaper and magazines that some things are written in full once and then have an abbreviation in brackets immediately after meaning that any future reference to that will be in abbreviated form. It's good practise.

[JamieLei]

What we've completely overlooked is actually business travellers to and from Heathrow and Gatwick. Most of them won't care how much it costs, as long as it gets them there fast and comfortably, hence the ability to charge extortionate prices. Quote from Railnews: "Go-Ahead said there had been “some softening in demand” on the Gatwick Express route, reflecting falling air traffic volumes in and out of the airport." Businesses are becoming especially prudent in the recession and cutting down on unnecessary costs, such as international travel when not needed.

[beeb375]

Well it's clear to see why business folk with expenses paid would use Heathrow Express, last summer I had the option of going direct to Heathrow using HE for about £16 single at the time, or using Heathrow Connect, which stops seven times on the way but cost £6.80 (only £1.70 with my privelege card tho ). So if your company is paying for you, why not use HE?