A top rail tip for you: I am sitting in first class aboard the 9.58am train from Brighton to London with only a standard ticket. But I am not trying my luck and hoping to evade revenue protection staff. The rear first-class carriage on Thameslink trains is always “declassified” to make more seats available for those of us with cheaper tickets.
Yet how I yearn for the era of the Brighton Belle. This was a premium first- and third-class only train, launched in 1933, that shuttled non-stop between London Victoria and Brighton in an hour. Today’s everyday successors, which pause twice along the way, are only a couple of minutes quicker on the 51-mile run.
