Trivia: Largest towns/cities in Great Britain without a direct rail link to London

[LeeLivery]

Redditch, Burton-upon-Trent, Wrexham and Lowestoft. Lowestoft is probably the largest town in Southern England without a direct link.

Also, Bury St Edmunds would probably make the top 20.

If you're including places without stations, Swadlincote and Newcastle-under-Lyme (though that's kind of the whole Manchester/Salford situation).

 

[Mojo]

Like Paisley is no more a suburb of Glasgow, a town in its own right which is near Glasgow.

I can tell you that Paisley is not in anyway a suburb of Glasgow (also my partner can confirm as well, as she is originally from Paisley), and it is a post town in its own right. The PA postcode area is centred around Paisley, while Glasgow has G codes with the range being G1 to G53 within the city council area. G60 to G84 covers the suburbs in Dunbartonshire, parts of Lanarkshire, and East Renfrewshire (former Eastwood District).

You can say what you like about the factual differences in counties (and former county-equivalents), post codes and postal towns which are all true. However international, UK and Scottish bodies including those responsible for statistics and allocation of funding, consider Paisley to be be part of the Glasgow urban area, just as they consider Salford and Bolton to be part of the Manchester urban area. This is a clear difference from Reading which is in a different region, a place from which you cannot get to London without passing through a built up area and without passing through green belt land.

 

[geoffk]

I don't think anyone has mentioned Dudley and West Bromwich (no rail service at all) or Walsall (soon to get a London service).

 

[B&I]

Bolton's services have been ruined in the last few years. I used to get direct trains from Oxford home, I could get to Kensington Olympia, bournemouth, Weymouth, Glasgow, Nottingham, Birmingham, even East Anglia And maybe Devon as well.

Now it's slow old boring connecting trains and bolton is clearly being downgraded in terms of service offering. It's a large independent town being turned into nothing more than a Manchester conurbation dormitory town

Bolton's services have been ruined in the last few years. I used to get direct trains from Oxford home, I could get to Kensington Olympia, bournemouth, Weymouth, Glasgow, Nottingham, Birmingham, even East Anglia And maybe Devon as well.

Now it's slow old boring connecting trains and bolton is clearly being downgraded in terms of service offering. It's a large independent town being turned into nothing more than a Manchester conurbation dormitory town

Along with everywhere else in the north west

 

[yorkie]

Tweedbank? Basically covers the whole Scottish Borders

Is the question asking for the largest catchment area, or the largest town? They're not the same thing.

 

[Esker-pades]

I don't think anyone has mentioned Dudley and West Bromwich (no rail service at all) or Walsall (soon to get a London service).

Dudley is served by Sandwell & Dudley which has 1tph to London.

 

[thenorthern]

Middlesbrough I think may have it.

There are other places like Gateshead which don't have a direct rail link to London but its next to Newcastle which does.

 

[Parallel]

Wrexham actually does have 1 direct rail service to Euston a day in the morning. Also one train in the evening from Euston. These trains split/join at Chester with services to/from Holyhead.

 

[Scouseinmanc]

Aberystwyth

 

[RLBH]

For this sort of question I think why not go with the experts? The ONS define 'built-up areas' aka conurbations and I think this gets best at the spirit of this sort of question, rather than local authority boundaries. You can explore the boundaries on a map here.

To that end, Teeside is the biggest without a London service at 376,000 - Eaglescliffe falls close to but outside the ONS' boundary. Birkenhead is next; Barnsley third.

I would question the validity of that map as it claims there are no towns or cities in Scotland.

 

[LeeLivery]

Wrexham actually does have 1 direct rail service to Euston a day in the morning. Also one train in the evening from Euston. These trains split/join at Chester with services to/from Holyhead.

I totally forgot! Still thinking of Wrexham & Shropshire ending

 

[tonysk14]

I can tell you that Paisley is not in anyway a suburb of Glasgow (also my partner can confirm as well, as she is originally from Paisley), and it is a post town in its own right. The PA postcode area is centred around Paisley, while Glasgow has G codes with the range being G1 to G53 within the city council area. G60 to G84 covers the suburbs in Dunbartonshire, parts of Lanarkshire, and East Renfrewshire (former Eastwood District).

Anybody who stands in County Square or at Paisley Cross and mentions that Paisley is part of Glasgow would see themselves dragged to the Gallow Green (once famous for burning witches in medieval times), hung, flogged, and have genitalia chopped off. The natives of Glasgow are referred to as Weegies, with the natives of Paisley being referred to Buddies (also the nickname of St Mirren FC - the one and only club where Alex Ferguson got the boot in 1978 after the directors lost patience).

I would suggest that someting similar would befall anyone who told a Salfordian their city was a suberb of Manchester.

 

[Altfish]

However it is accurate in practical terms. Bolton less so, as it is a stand-alone town by almost every measure. It's no more a suburb of Manchester than Reading is a suburb of London or Huddersfield a suburb of Leeds.

Bolton is a suburb of Manchester, like it or not. Ask the thousand that travel from there to Manchester for work every morning. It is in the same category as Rochdale, Bury, Oldham and Altrincham.
Bolton is less than 12 miles from Manchester

 

[Jorge Da Silva]

Redditch, Burton-upon-Trent, Wrexham and Lowestoft. Lowestoft is probably the largest town in Southern England without a direct link.

Also, Bury St Edmunds would probably make the top 20.

If you're including places without stations, Swadlincote and Newcastle-under-Lyme (though that's kind of the whole Manchester/Salford situation).

Isn’t Lowestoft going to get a direct link to London as part of the Greater Anglia Franchise four times a day?

 

[CaptainHaddock]

Redditch, Burton-upon-Trent, Wrexham and Lowestoft. Lowestoft is probably the largest town in Southern England without a direct link.

Also, Bury St Edmunds would probably make the top 20.

If you're including places without stations, Swadlincote and Newcastle-under-Lyme (though that's kind of the whole Manchester/Salford situation).

Wouldn't Gosport (population over 82,000) beat Lowestoft for the Southern England crown?

 

[LeeLivery]

Isn’t Lowestoft going to get a direct link to London as part of the Greater Anglia Franchise four times a day?

Indeed it will.

 

[LeeLivery]

Wouldn't Gosport (population over 82,000) beat Lowestoft for the Southern England crown?

Yes

 

[al78]

Calling Salford a suburb of Manchester is like calling Croydon a suburb of London.

They are separate cities, Salford was even founded before Manchester. The question was what are the largest towns and cities without a direct rail link to London. No restriction was imposed that required those cities to be distant from other cities with a direct rail link.

 

[RLBH]

In the interests of asinine pedantry: I do not believe there is any main line rail connection from the City of Westminster to the City of London.

With this in mind, I must immediately insist that the District Line is rated an intercity route, upgraded to allow 140mph running, and buffet cars provided.

 

[gallafent]

In the interests of asinine pedantry

That most noble pursuit!

 

[gallafent]

In other news, St. David's in Pembrokeshire is the smallest city (by population) in the UK, and (surprisingly enough) doesn't have a rail link. Perhaps a branch off the Carmarthen<->Aberystwyth line should be added to that project's scope.

Seriously, though, infrastructure projects in this country, right, we've been talking about this since 1880, why can't we just get on and do it? https://spellerweb.net/rhindex/UKRH/GreatWestern/Narrowgauge/StDavids.html …

 

[Mikey C]

In the interests of asinine pedantry: I do not believe there is any main line rail connection from the City of Westminster to the City of London.

With this in mind, I must immediately insist that the District Line is rated an intercity route, upgraded to allow 140mph running, and buffet cars provided.

It always amuses me when City fans say that Manchester United aren't based in Manchester, as by that logic NO football teams are based in the City of London!

A direct mainline train would be quite easy from Westminster to London actually, you'd just need a shuttle between Charing Cross and Cannon Street

 

[Phil H]

Daventry...?

 

[coppercapped]

I would question the validity of that map as it claims there are no towns or cities in Scotland.

The legend says quite clearly

A swipe map to show the differences between the towns and cities and the built-up areas within England and Wales

 

[mlambeuk]

Hexham

 

[Jorge Da Silva]

Grimsby Town (86,000) and Cleethorpes (40,000).

 

[LeeLivery]

Calling Salford a suburb of Manchester is like calling Croydon a suburb of London.

They are separate cities, Salford was even founded before Manchester. The question was what are the largest towns and cities without a direct rail link to London. No restriction was imposed that required those cities to be distant from other cities with a direct rail link.

Not really, Croydon is as much part of London as Stratford and Acton are. The London Borough of Croydon doesn't even have city status.

 

[InOban]

In Scotland it's definitely Paisley. 77k.

 

[gord]

Lowestoft has had a London service removed and re-installed more times then I can remember. Everything from full on intercity trains to 2/3 car Turbostars have attempted the service over the years.

Does Great Yarmouth still have a direct service to Liverpool Street? Been a long time since I was back over that way.

Shrewsbury would have been a good answer until a couple of years ago. Wrexham also gets a Virgin Train visiting now and again doesn't it?

Do Virgin still go to Llandudno?

Quite a difficult question to keep up with as these 'smaller' places have seen a lot of chopping and changing over the years.

 

[paul1609]

I can tell you that Paisley is not in anyway a suburb of Glasgow (also my partner can confirm as well, as she is originally from Paisley), and it is a post town in its own right. The PA postcode area is centred around Paisley, while Glasgow has G codes with the range being G1 to G53 within the city council area. G60 to G84 covers the suburbs in Dunbartonshire, parts of Lanarkshire, and East Renfrewshire (former Eastwood District).

Anybody who stands in County Square or at Paisley Cross and mentions that Paisley is part of Glasgow would see themselves dragged to the Gallow Green (once famous for burning witches in medieval times), hung, flogged, and have genitalia chopped off. The natives of Glasgow are referred to as Weegies, with the natives of Paisley being referred to Buddies (also the nickname of St Mirren FC - the one and only club where Alex Ferguson got the boot in 1978 after the directors lost patience).

Presumably Ive been landing and taking off from Paisley International Airport for the past 2 years without knowing it....
(Despite being a pretty pro Scot Man of Kent I'm ashamed to admit I didn't even know where St Mirren was until I was driven to cheap off site airport parking)