What if the SER had built the South Eastern Main Line via Sevenoaks first?

[AY1975]

The fact that there are two parallel routes on the northernmost section of the Brighton Main Line, i.e. the Redhill line and the Quarry line (the latter bypassing Redhill and used mainly by fast services while the former is used mainly by semi-fast and stopping trains that call at Redhill) is a legacy of the days of competition between the London Brighton & South Coast Railway and the South Eastern Railway on this section of the route, as the SER built its London to Dover main line via Redhill and Tonbridge first with the more direct route via Sevenoaks only being added later. Until that time, the SER had to use the northermost section of the Brighton Line which it shared with the LB&SCR, but parliament eventually forced the sale of this section to the SER. This ultimately led the LB&SCR to build its own parallel route, bypassing Redhill, and this has shaped service patterns on the BML ever since.

Let us suppose that, instead, the SER had built the South Eastern Main Line via Sevenoaks first, with the Tonbridge to Redhill line only being added after the Brighton Main Line had been built. In that case there would presumably not have been any need for two parallel routes: there would just be one route, and it would have served Redhill. It would probably still have had separate Fast and Slow tracks at least as far south as Three Bridges, though.

I wonder how different service patterns on the BML would have been under that alternative scenario? Would many trains that bypass Redhill have called there if they could, or maybe Redhill would have been on a par with, say, Three Bridges in terms of which trains called there and which ones passed through non-stop?

 

[yorksrob]

I guess that the original line via Merstham would have been four tracked in the normal way, rather than as a separate quarry line.

Interesting to consider what, if anything would have been built East and West of Redhill !

 

[30907]

Interesting to consider what, if anything would have been built East and West of Redhill !

Possibly nothing! Or LBSCR might have built a line to Godstone, Oxted, Edenbridge, T Wells and a short branch to Reigate?

Can't see a need at that stage for a line to Tonbridge OR Guildford.

 

[RichJF]

Possibly nothing! Or LBSCR might have built a line to Godstone, Oxted, Edenbridge, T Wells and a short branch to Reigate?

Can't see a need at that stage for a line to Tonbridge OR Guildford.

Would be interesting if you ponder about the Three Bridges - T Wells - Tonbridge route too. Might have negated the need for the Tonbridge line.

 

[Sad Sprinter]

I think the original intention at least was to branch off at “Jolly Sailor” so such a route would probably have reached Tonbridge via Addington and Westerham.

In such a scenario, the Caterham and Tattenham Corner branches would also most likely not have been built.

Perhaps to serve the Chipstead area a line from Hackbridge to Coulsdon via Carshalton Beeches might be built?

How would South Coast to Midlands/Northern England traffic be routed without the Morth Downs line?

 

[etr221]

When the South Eastern was originally being planned - in the mid 1830s - there were various projects for railways from London to east/south east Kent - one likely alternative was an extension from the London & Greenwich via Gravesend to Dover by routes which have at least a passing similarity to lines later built by LC&DR. And the SER - as originally put to Parliament - was rather different, with a route via Oxted (with (at times) a branch thence to Brighton (which was also the target of various schemes). And it was in the development of all these into something that would actually be authorised and built (at that time the North Downs were still seen as a significant obstacle, so less tunnelling was significant benefit) that led to what actually came about: an extension from the the London & Croydon to a junction at 'Reigate' (Redhill), shared between the London & Brighton (would then head south) and the South Eastern (who would head east to Folkestone and Dover) - which was the basis of the network we know (and love?) in Kent, Surrey and Sussex. Had any of the other projects come about, there would have been a different basis, and so a - potentially very - different final network developed from it.

 

[yorksrob]

Would be interesting if you ponder about the Three Bridges - T Wells - Tonbridge route too. Might have negated the need for the Tonbridge line.

If development had been led by the LB&SCR, it might well have been developed as the main E-W route, given that it passed through larger settlements.