Commuting to London

kingkelly

Thank you for all your help.

It's all been very constructive and has helped enormously.

Cheers
Sam

dfarry

lynzpower wrote:

likewise Bexleys nice. Im not sure on the commute Ive never done it, but Old bexley is lovely. A mate of mine from work lives there she says the commute is fine

Hi... too quote Lyn... I live in Welling (Bexley LA) and have done all my life but am shortly going to move to Uckfield in East Sussex.

I also worked in central London until last year, now I work in Crawley so that has been a factor in the move to E. Sussex.

Bexley is OK....it is cheaper than Bromley and is as close to London, local services and facilities are quite good. There is a good mix of park and woodland too though any available land soon has a house/flats built on it.

There are three main lines (Sidcup, Bexleyheath and Erith) into Charing X, London Bridge and Cannon Street, also I think there is still a route into Victoria. A downside is that many of these routes go through Lewisham and New Cross and that often proves to be a bottle neck (or can prevent you getting into London altogether). In the end I decided to learn to ride a motorbike and commuted that way.

Another downside as you will find in any of the suburbs, is traffic, congestion, noise, dirt....basically all the stuff you expect part of of a city like London.

I think E. Sussex will give us a quieter and slower paced lifestyle as well as a nice place to bring up our kids. Uckfield for example is on a mainline fast route into London so if I ever work back there it wont be a problem.

Tunbridge Wells is nice but is expensive. Gillingham I have heard has really down in recent years so make sure you check out the area thoroughly.

Burgess Hill, Haywards Heath, East Grinstead, Maidstone are all area's that are well connected to London and surrounding town.

Jeffro_toll

Hi,
I am looking to buy for the first time and my wife and I have our hearts set on Tring. After further looking into it the monthly train ticket from Tring is £380, why is it so much? It is pretty much cost prohibitive now to consider living there and we are now looking at Hertford which is £204 per month, completely dazzeled at the price difference given they are the same distance outside of London - does anyone have a clue why this is so???
On that note does anyone know why transport in London/England is about 4-6 times higher than the rest of the world, how has this happened!!!!
I lived in Australia for a time and it cost me £10 a week to travel the same distance as say Tring or Hertford.
Thanks a bunch

BitterAndTwisted

Because the train companies know they have their commuters by the short-and-curlies?

scooter_chick

Firstly it depends WHERE in London you're comuting to. You have to think about time/hassle/what can go wrong as well as the cost. For example train + 2 tubes would possibly drive you bonkers in a few weeks, however resiliant you are. You need to think about the practicalities of your whole journey.

I bought a book called something like the 'Telegraph guide to Commuterland'. It takes each of the mainline train stations & then gives a review of each town/stop on the line. Includes costs of properties, season tickets and the train frequencies. It's better than trying to use a road atlas to figure out your options.

Good MSE tip - get an old edition from Amazon or somewhere. I think I used the 2005 one, needed a bit more research to get up to date prices, but a new version is about £12.

westv

scooter_chick wrote: »

I bought a book called something like the 'Telegraph guide to Commuterland'. It takes each of the mainline train stations & then gives a review of each town/stop on the line. Includes costs of properties, season tickets and the train frequencies. It's better than trying to use a road atlas to figure out your options.

Good MSE tip - get an old edition from Amazon or somewhere. I think I used the 2005 one, needed a bit more research to get up to date prices, but a new version is about £12.

I just found this

http://www.commuterguide.co.uk/

at first glance looks quite interesting.

scooter_chick

Yes, that website is associated with the book I mentioned.

harz99

Is this Jeff TROLL resurrecting a very old post after 4 years.............

harz99

chucknorris wrote: »

Don't forget to add a value to your time, your quality of life is worth something too. Although some might (with justification) argue that the time spent travelling is worth it to be in a better place at the weekends/summer evenings/days off but that is of course very subjective

I would think that after FOUR years kingkelly would have been sorted by now!

chucknorris

harz99 wrote: »

I would think that after FOUR years kingkelly would have been sorted by now!

Do you think I genuinely thought he still neded advice after 4 years or perhaps didn't notice that someone had resurected a 4 year thread? I'll give you a betting hint:

10,000/1 - still needed advice after 4 yaers
no offers - overlooked the thread was old

original reply deleted