High speed services introduced at weekends
Southeastern today announced that high speed services will be extended to weekends, starting on Saturday 10 October. The new service will provide an hourly return service from St Pancras International to Ashford International, as well as a half hourly return shuttle service from Ebbsfleet International to St Pancras International.
The new services, operating on both Saturdays and Sundays, will allow people to travel to central London to go shopping, visit attractions or go to the theatre, with the first train leaving Ashford International on Saturday at 09.18 and the last return train departing St Pancras International at 18.38.
Charles Horton, managing director, Southeastern said, "The introduction of the weekend trains is another vital part of extending our preview services. Many, who work during the week and have not used the service already, will now be just 37 minutes from central London where they can go shopping, take the family to a West End matinee or go to sporting events and still make the last train back to Ashford International. Alternatively people in London are now just 17 minutes away from Ebbsfleet International where it is just a short bus ride to Bluewater for weekend shopping."
The preview services have proven so popular that they were recently extended to Dover, Folkestone, Canterbury and Ramsgate during the week. These new services have attracted so many passengers that Southeastern has been forced to double the length of another service. The 18.37 from St Pancras International to Dover Priory has been increased from six coaches to 12 to prevent passengers having to stand. This comes after doubling the length of the 06.42 train from Dover Priory to St Pancras International after only the second week of running the service.
Southeastern also confirmed that from the end of this week passengers will be able to purchase monthly and longer season tickets for high speed services from railway stations or online.
Source: Southeastern Railway
