Could steam specials ever start from London Bridge in the future

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When all the works at London Bridge are finished, would it ever be possible to run a steam tour from there or would there be no spare capacity?

What I'd love to see one day is a special steam service from London Bridge to Brighton via Horsted Keynes and Haywards Heath. It's after all the route some trains took from London to reach Brighton.

That does require the Ardingly branch to be reopened of course but I'm confident it will happen some day. As far as I'm aware, no trains ran solely from East Grinstead to Lewes and / or Haywards Heath. They started at London Bridge and either finished in Brighton, Eastbourne or possible later at night, at a station along the Bluebell line.

My 1949 summer timetable has an Eastbourne to Horsted Keynes service. I'm guessing it went to Horsted Keynes in order to be moved out of the way of Haywards Heath but I don't actually know.

 

[STEVIEBOY1]

When all the works at London Bridge are finished, would it ever be possible to run a steam tour from there or would there be no spare capacity?

What I'd love to see one day is a special steam service from London Bridge to Brighton via Horsted Keynes and Haywards Heath. It's after all the route some trains took from London to reach Brighton.

That does require the Ardingly branch to be reopened of course but I'm confident it will happen some day. As far as I'm aware, no trains ran solely from East Grinstead to Lewes and / or Haywards Heath. They started at London Bridge and either finished in Brighton, Eastbourne or possible later at night, at a station along the Bluebell line.

My 1949 summer timetable has an Eastbourne to Horsted Keynes service. I'm guessing it went to Horsted Keynes in order to be moved out of the way of Haywards Heath but I don't actually know.

Never say Never, it could happen. After all, I am fairly sure that there have been a few steam specials from both the rebuilt St. Pancras & Kings Cross Railway stations & Liverpool Street. I have even been on one from Cannon Street in recent years.

I think the Bluebell Railway do want to reopen the Ardingly branch too. I think there may be a missing bridge that needs to go back in place to do that though.

 

[Bevan Price]

The Brighton - London services via Horsted Keynes mostly ran via Lewes & Sheffield Park until that line was closed.

Horsted Keynes - Haywards Heath / Brighton was worked by emus for many years.

 

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The Brighton - London services via Horsted Keynes mostly ran via Lewes & Sheffield Park until that line was closed.

Horsted Keynes - Haywards Heath / Brighton was worked by emus for many years.

Indeed it did. I think it was just one or two trains a day that went via Haywards Heath or at least they did in the 40s and as the Ardingly branch is likely to reopen before any line reaches Lewes, I think a train from London Bridge via Ardingly would be great achievement. Of course one day they hope to run to Lewes and then I'd love to see a special to Brighton via Lewes.

The Bluebell own a replacement bridge. It's not the same as the original viaduct but it's better than nothing and would keep costs down.