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Southern joins GTR to become largest UK franchise from Sunday

This weekend marks the integration of Southern, Gatwick Express and some Southeastern services with the Great Northern and Thameslink networks to form the largest single UK franchise.

The Thameslink, Southern and Great Northern (TSGN) franchise will be operated by Govia Thameslink Railway (GTR), part of Govia, a joint venture between Go-Ahead Group (65%) and Keolis (35%).

The Southern and Gatwick Express brand identities will be retained alongside those of Thameslink and Great Northern, however. GTR has been running the Thameslink and Great Northern services since September 2014, when it took over from First Capital Connect.

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Upgrades already include 29 new Electrostar four-car Class 387/1s on the Thameslink route, themselves to be soon replaced by the Siemens-built Class 700 fleet. The Gatwick Express fleet is also being modernised.

A spokesperson for GTR said in a statement that the franchise fusion would allow them to “invest heavily in a better service for passengers”.

He added: “We’ve already brought in new trains on the Brighton Main Line and, as one company, we’ll be able to completely recast this route’s timetable in December to give passengers a more reliable service.”

The larger franchise will introduce nearly 1,400 new train carriages across its network along with 10,000 additional morning peak seats on crowded services to London in order to increase capacity by 50%.

GTR guaranteed that several stations would be upgraded with more than £50m being spent on the investment, from “improving access to free wi-fi” and extended Smartcard ticketing. They will also make the way they calculate ‘delay repay’ compensation for Southern and Gatwick Express customers the same as Thameslink and Great Northern, which is 5% more.

Other operational changes will include dropping the on-board trolley service as Southern said that this is “no longer our customers’ preferred service”.

Top image c. Andrew Matthews