North Downs Line (Reading to Gatwick Airport) - DRIVERS EYE VIEW 

An little masterpiece! Love the lineside footage which sets the train and the line in its environment and adds a whole new dimension to the driver’s eye view. A lot of hard work has gone into producing this. Thank you very much.

Fascinating thank you to all involved, a lovely picturesque journey.

The North Downs Line is perhaps the strangest line, it’s operated by Great Western, runs in South Western rail network but was built by South Eastern

Enjoyed the journey and commentary. Well done and many thanks.

Fascinating, with excellent commentary. Thanks.

I enjoyed this video. An excellent production, lovely narration by Roseanna Shaw. Superb all round.

An excellent production, easily as good as Video 125!

Love the route between Guildford and redhill

Excellent video. Love the historical information. Thank you

Very well presented - best of all no intrusive music (except at the end!). Well narrated too. I know the Redhill - Dorking stretch fairly well, and those two level crossings (Betchworth & Reigate) are a nightmare for road users. Reigate in particular - its a busy link road, the A217, from the M25 to Redhill. There's no other practical way. And its worth noting that this route can be used as a good way to get from Birmingham to Gatwick. Bit longer, but only one change at Reading, rather than 2 and a tube ride across London!

I worked on the North downs line 20 years ago for first group many good memories an excellent presentation and narration very informative 👏

Great and pleasant. 'Walking transaction' did I hear at 24mins? I must ask my wife about this!

I remember working on old Royal Mail siding in Redhill station in the 80s/90s. A mail only train ran between London bridge and Redhill every few hours if memory serves along with the scheduled passenger services The overhead tunnel across the platforms conveyed mail bags hanging from hooks on a rail system which also ran around the adjacent sorting office. Excellent video.

Absolutely brilliant! Best bit is between Reigate and Guildford. Did it twice last year (2019) and in glorious weather! I’d love to have spent a night or two down there.

I have several Video 125 videos and I have to say yours are of the same high quality. In my opinion, you have a superior commentary. 🐨🇦🇺

Did this in 2019 en route from Cornwall for holiday in Greece. Normally flew to Gatwick but Flybe changed route to Heathrow. Excellent journey. Made a good job of Reading station.

Excellent. So convenient for travellers from the west and Wales heading for Gatwick airport.

What a great video. Well done on every front. It brings back all kinds of great memories using this line in both directions from Guildford as a boy, teenager and young adult. Living abroad, I really appreciate what a beautiful part of the country this is. Not to mention that in Canada's case, even these maligned DMU's are head and shoulders above our local options :)

Really enjoyed this trip on a line I have never travelled on. Very good presentation and commentary with lots of local and historic info. Also liked very much the cutaway shots from the lineside ... revealed a further dimension to the trip. Well done!! Please continue in this vein if you can. Regards, AB

Excellent video. The Turbos are still good units for the Gatwick run, certainly better than the old WR and SR DMUs. A journey by SR 'Thumper' back in the day was excruciatingly slow. Just needs GWR asap to add the 'proper' fasts that were going to run pre-pandemic; I believe that there were also proposals for 90mph along the Blackwater valley stretch which would knock a few more minutes off....

I rode this route from Gatwick to Reading and back when I was in the UK for business back in 1994 or 1995. I can’t say for sure, but I believe they were 119 DMUs back then, but I don’t know if the unit traveling to Reading was having mechanical issues, but it seemed to struggle with ever minor change in grade and the driver was frequently downshifting to get the train over the railway. Nothing express about it then either as it took close to two hours to complete the trip, with the train rarely getting over 45mph - or so it seemed. Nice to see things have improved substantially in the past 26 years.

Box hill on the left was my playground as a kid, Now of course the class 165/166 no longer are run on this route and the BR Class 769 run on this line now. Great video.

Brilliant - thank you!

A very interesting and informative film, I particularly enjoyed the additional trackside and station footage

I remember this line so well having lived in Reading (Early) from 89-98. Network Southeast/Southwest trains as it was known then before GWR took over. Miss Reading a lot :)

As a kid, we travelled often from Reading on this line to go swimming in Martin's Pool in Wokingham, now of course long gone - but the memory lingers. Thanks for the update on this line, unrecognizable as it now is !! And for the quality not only of the cab video but for the commentary and the roadside pics. Reporting from Philadelphia, USA. You just got another Subscriber.

I was racking my brains about what the video style of internal and external views reminded me of. It's the 2012 Olympics opening video where they're travelling down the Thames, with little vignettes along the way. Good to see the forward view of what I'm used to seeing out the side windows. I'm always looking out the left and miss the Henry Wicks pheasant topiary.

I'm glad to see that the Jessie's Seat topiary is still there.

It’s always random at Guildford when you see all the South Western train and a GWR rocks up.

I used to be in a boarding school in Redhill and always enjoyed admiring the views on the turbos, although thrashing was the best part!

Thoroughly enjoyed this, I was a Signalman at Betchworth, and later Reigate circa 1981. I never saw it from the drivers perspective, so thank you. Nostalgia it may be, but sad to see the demise of Signal Boxes at Shalford, Redhill (A and B boxes) but many more had closed before my time. To add to your commentary, I think there was a branch line at Chilworth leading to a munitions factory which suffered an explosion during WW1 - another branch led to another munitions factory just east of Betchworth.

Great historical commentary!

great journey . thanks

Very good and interesting video, thanks a lot !!!

I like the sound the 166 makes when it starts accelerating

I used this line most times that I went to stay with my sister in the USA: Bracknell to Gatwick Airport. I could never decide whether it was quicker/easier to go to Wokingham and then get the Reading-Gatwick train, or to go to Clapham Junction and get a Victoria-Gatwick train, but the North Downs Line was certainly a nicer route.

Not having travelled on this line since the heyday of the Tadpoles, much is barely recognisable. Gone is the Huntley and Palmers biscuit factory and the extremely parsimonious Platform 4a at Reading (old pre-nationalisation habits died hard when Reading Southern closed in 1965); good to see a proper terminus there again.

Great video

The connection between this line and the main line at Dorking superfluous - no way; would love to have that connection back.

Miss these lines now live in spalding lincs but used to regularly travel these lines as im originally from Guildford

Crowthorne is my home village! I have mixed feelings about possible electrification of the route. It would bring benefits, but the diesel trains give the line a lot of character.

You should do these more often!

Nicely narrated by Roseanna with some interesting information, well done

Worked in the Farnham, Chertsey Area for a couple of years when Thatcher was in power. So travelled this route quite a few times in those two years as to avoid London. Of course then it was 1950's DMU's running the service.

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I wonder if there'll be a service one day between Reading & Ashford International via Gatwick Airport, ..?

Bloody typical these trains skipping Farnborough North! Such a ballache.

An interesting video. A minor error, The present station at Horley is several hundred yards south of the original, which was largely swept away by the quadrupling scheme.

Great quality of filming, the sort of standard expected of Video 125's Peter Middleton :)

One of my routes back in 1990. Did my final stint on here. You could loose the backgroung jibber jabber too. Add's nothing. The lady giving the info though is good if a lttle synthetic😎

My local line! :)

Why is quality of the video different from that filmed on the outside and through the cab window? Considering it's filmed 1080p, the quality is quite poor through the cab window.

I wish track companies would recover and recycle the scrap rails just left lying around.

I've used this service a few times, the only negatives are it's a slow ride in an awful, ancient and very uncomfortable train, usually 3 coaches which means as it's a commuter service they get very crowded at busy times of the day.

This is professional standard.

Wonderful, as a very small boy I would walk to Crowthorne station to watch the last steam trains on the line, oh to have had a camera.

There's potential for Class 387s to be used on this line if ever the rest of the North Downs Line is Electrified

A very interesting video of a line I used to travel regularly many years ago. Very changed since then, though the units were green. Some interesting facts along the way, but somewhat spoiled by the very unconvincing and wooden narration, obviously not practised beforehand. But a minor quibble.

What is the average train speed of this journey.

Worked that for 19 years.

do trains still run from Reading to Tonbridge?

Enjoyable, though maybe a tad long. I have fond memories of the Tadpole units British Rail used to operate on this line, when they ran from Reading to Tonbridge. I was curious about the voices in the background to this video, who were speaking in Spanish. Were they a party of RENFE train drivers? I had to laugh at the "walking transaction between the two stations" at North Camp - in other words, you go on foot. (Or hoofing it!) - what in heaven's name is a "walking transaction" meant to be? Finally, I always thought Earley was pronounced as in the two things on either side of your head - not the opposite of late as in the commentary! Overall, a good effort though.

I understand that the 165/166 replacements, the 769s, have been sent back to Porterbrook as they are too poor quality. Will the Turbos see their half century?

Nice video, can you bring cab view from Windsor & Riverside Station to London Waterloo.

It is pathetic that the sections of unelectrified line on this route have not been infilled, Reigate to Shalford Junction and Ash Vale to Wokingham.

44:50 They only use 3 car 165s now and are being replaced by class 769s soon

GWR Class 165

Constructive criticism! Whilst the narrator undoubtedly has a soothing voice, I would suggest that in future she familiarises herself more fully with the script. The more than occasional emphasis on the wrong words made the narration grate at times. Otherwise an excellent production, thanks for sharing.

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You might want to check some of the information in the video. Nice narration but the tone and volume jumps around. This spoils an otherwise great video.

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