Gatwick to Kings Cross station

There is a train from Gatwick Airport to London St Pancras station. From there it is a short walk to Kings Cross Station. Looks like the journey takes about an hour. Fare is a little over £10

Joel is referring to the Thameslink service. There are 3 trains an hour at most times of day.

Kings Cross and St Pancras are adjacent. I would allow at least 90 minutes for this journey from Gatwick.

After doing a lot of research on how to quickly get from Gatwick to London we used the Thameslink when I was in London last year. The Thameslink tickets are bought in the Gatwick Airport ( people behind the window were extremely helpful ), the train goes from Gatwick to Saint Pancras Station. . Kings Cross station is across the street from Saint Pancras— super easy, smooth ride, big windows, and I think we even had Wi-Fi for most of the journey.

A warning - this month a new timetable was introduced for Thameslink services and due to failings by both the government and the rail company they have utterly screwed it up. I would not recommend that you rely on trains between Gatwick and St Pancras running at the advertised times or at all. You may have to take a train to Victoria and then the underground to Kings Cross.

A warning - this month a new timetable was introduced for Thameslink
services and due to failings by both the government and the rail
company they have utterly screwed it up. I would not recommend that
you rely on trains between Gatwick and St Pancras running at the
advertised times or at all. You may have to take a train to Victoria
and then the underground to Kings Cross.

Thank you for this^^^. I'm sitting here fiddling with possible trip itineraries, including flights into Gatwick. When I went to the National Rail online journey planner, these routes were marked with a "service alert" which linked to a page of "service alteration details." . It says, which may be lovely understatement, about the Thameslink:

Short-term timetable amendments mean fewer trains are able to run
across the Thameslink and Great Northern network.

Customer Advice:

Some trains will be cancelled as Thameslink and Great Northern roll
out the new timetable and you are strongly advise you to check your
journey before you travel.

I think that's Brit organization-speak for "we utterly screwed this up." I wonder if they'll get the kinks worked out in a few months. Let's hope so.

Don't forget that the owner of Thameslink is the same GTR who also own Southern, the line famous for its strikes and awful service.

… and that Southern operate the Gatwick Express ...

Southern-branded services have been better over the last couple of weeks.

Suz -

You are completely correct about the Brit speak. It has been a highly organised, completely successful cock up of enormous proportions!

You know it's bad when the CEO of Thameslink, who likened their problems to being like 'Poundland baking chocolate' got a funny but thorough kicking from the management of Poundland who threatened to refer to any problems they might have in future as 'a bit Thameslink' and to alert their 'twitchy legal team' as regards the implied insult against Poundland. Worth looking up on the web for the laughs!

Ian

of course, everything is roses and champers at Northern up your way, Ian

As I have been pondering where to spend our Gatwick layover evening outing time- London or Brighton - I priced trains and cannot find this about $10 train you are referring to. When I price with Gatwick Express, Thames, Southern...it seems like it will cost the two of us $80 roundtrip to go into London for a few hours and $20 to go down to Brighton. So we are doing Brighton but I am curious about those train fares you see. Can someone post a link?

Thanks:)

off peak day return from Gatwick to St Pancras £11.80

http://ojp.nationalrail.co.uk/service/timesandfares/GTW/STP/130618/0930/dep/130618/1130/dep#outwardJump

Thank you very much! Got it!!!

Nigel -

As a user of Northern Rail I'm not letting them off the hook either! Champers and roses might help though. A bit.

Ian

The Thameslink train from Gatwick to St Pancras takes one hour. direct if you take it on a week-day. On week-ends the train may not go all the way to Gatwick stopping at another station, because of week-end construction, from which you need to connect to the Tube to reach Kings Cross. Use the Oyster Card to ride the Thameslink, it's cheaper that way than a regular ticket.