[Anonymous]

[andystock]

The new kings cross opened today, it is an amazing sight, looks so smart. The new Fullers pub is huge it even has an indoor court yard with an impressive range of ales.

[Bucksnet]

It should look smart for £550 million!

[Henkel.Trocken]

I passed through KX over the weekend, most impressive.

It has looked like the poor relation to St Pancras and Euston for as long as I can remember and very shabby since St Pancras was cleaned up for Eurostar but now it’s a bright and pleasant place but do learn the trick of finding the shortcut to the tube or you will walk to St Pancras and back to get it.

[RichHI1]

It is great to see KX and St P given a new lease Of life unlike the 1960’s treatment of Euston. They need to be preserved as history but it cannot be efficient to have Euston, St Pancras and Kings Cross all virtually next door to each other.

[Bucksnet]

Rich, each station serves different routes, and it’s not possible to have one station doing them all; there are far too many trains every day.

[LeTigre]

After doing a thorough assessment of the design, I agree it is a great improvement. The exterior architecture is particularly impressive and the level of natural light is also great. However, I wish the concourse was a bit larger and stretched towards the previous entrance like at St Pancras because it hasn’t really fixed the problem of extreme congestion all at one point. I know the work isn’t finished so I’m guessing they’ll try and address that. The only way to really improve the station now is to extend the modern part so the people are evenly distributed.

[RichHI1]

Bucksnet I would not want to change them. As you observe they are different routes and the tracks are at different levels as some go under the canal to the north and some go over. I just observed how odd it is to still have 3 stations in spitting distance. If one looks to cities like Brussels a decision was taken to unify the system whereas London like Paris still maintains the legacy of the Victorian origins of Rail.

[Age_of_Reason]

The ‘big issue’ remains that terminus stations create bottlenecks – witness various comments above. Very few people using KX mainline are actually travelling to anywhere walkable from the station. So a better distrtibution of passengers to a choice of interchanges is required.

In the ‘good old days’ KX Intercitys stopped at Stevenage for dropoff/pickup – this is not longer so (I think). But Steveage is now Thameslink and provides the ideal cross-platform transfer//step-free change point.

There’s no enthusiasm in Coalition-UK for northern through connections to the ChannelTunnel – something maybe DB will right, next decade – but something is needed to avoid the painful road crossing between KX and StP?

So we will comntinue to fly the Channel, to the detriment of the UK Carbon footprint.

[TimFitzgeraldTC]

In response to Age of Reason – some intercity services do stop at Stevenage still and no they are not Thameslink. they are First Capital Connect (which is the same company as the old Thameslink which are also FCC) but there is no crossover of routes.

In a few years this will change once the Very late T2000 project is finished – however whether changes will be worth it at Stevenage will depend on timetables. I don’t change at Luton for South Coast services when coming down from Nottingham/Sheffield as it extends journey time. People may find the same at Stevenage / KCX once these routes finally come on in the next few years.

[SimonS1]

AofR is correct as Thameslink is still the name of the franchise area. FCC are simply the current operators. The DfT are currently tendering the franchise as it runs out next year and all the documents refer to ‘Thameslink’.

It is not the ‘same company’ as the old Thameslink company. That was owned by GoVia, FCC is owned by First Group.

[TimFitzgeraldTC]

The point I am making is whilst they are the same franchise at the moment there is no crossover of routes – so Stevenage is not currently on the “Thameslink” network – there are no services from Stevenage to the South of London. This will change in future once the T2000 project nears completion. But there will be a change in franchises as the new “Thameslink” is likely to be integrated with the Southern franchise. How this will affect the old Great Northen routes (which is what FCC through Stevenage currently is) that only operate to KGX I don’t know. It will become a huge franchise if it is Southern, Thameslink and Great Northern are rolled into 1.

[Tim2soza]

With STP and KX only 50 metres apart, and now connected via foot tunnel, they really can be treated as one station. You can certainly change from any STP platform to any KX platform quicker than you can get from STP platforms to the Victoria Line tube platform serving both stations.

I gather platform 9 3/4 is back at KX for Harry Potter fans.

[LPPSKrisflyer]

FlightOracle – 24/04/2012 12:16 GMT
‘It will become a huge franchise if it is Southern, Thameslink and Great Northern are rolled into 1.’

Perhaps it should be called Network South East?

[Age_of_Reason]

Thanks all – I see that London is nothing if not dynamically changing. FCC would also be the operator of the underpublicised LHR ‘stopping service’ which connects into the Underground at Ealing Bdy, although absent from all maps. Like Heathrow Express t serves to dump large footfalls into Paddington, which has its attractions but is only a staging post for ‘London’, esp City. Seems an opportunity was missed to improve rapid connectivity along the KX/StP/Euston/Marylebone/Paddgtn corridor (being only partially remedied at huge expense by Crossrail). Given the loss of regional air connections into LHR, the fast rail alternatives are not that good if carrying more than a briefcase.

I’m beginning to understand that HS2, with impressive point-to-point timings at impressive cost is not going to do much for those left using the KX/StP arrivals area. Running to LHR makes sense – but Euston does not? – StP/KX would be better?.

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