# Moving to south east!! London/crawley/surrey/gatwick



## neelxxshb (Mar 17, 2014)

Hi there everyone,
I currently live in north london and planning on moving with my partner after 10 years living in this area.
my partner recently got a job at Gatwick airport and I currently work in central london. We both will be working shift work and that involves travelling into london or Gatwick in middle of the night.

we were considering moving to Purley (croydon borough) as didnt like the extreme buzz of east croydon area.
we both in our late 20s/early 30s ages but we are not interested in going out or the madness of an area. We would like a convenient but quite-ish and safe neighborhood from where we can commute to either london or Gatwick in the middle of the night if we have to.

can anyone please suggest any areas and how is Purley to live in?
A train service in the middle of the night is defi a must to london and gatwick

thanks a lot


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## Puddy_Tat (Mar 17, 2014)

If you want a night train service, that pretty much narrows it down to somewhere fairly close to East Croydon or Purley.

although of course there are night trains across the Thameslink route to Gatwick.

Bear in mind though there's night buses / 24 hour bus routes in to Croydon from various directions.

Night buses pretty much don't exist once you get outside the greater london / zone 6 boundary


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## ska invita (Mar 17, 2014)

i never knew there were any night trains - is Thameslink Gatwick branch 24hrs?


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## _pH_ (Mar 17, 2014)

ska invita said:


> i never knew there were any night trains - is Thameslink Gatwick branch 24hrs?


Yeah. Plus there is Gatwick Express which runs 24 hrs from Victoria and hourly stopping trains Victoria to Three Bridges.


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## ska invita (Mar 17, 2014)

Good to know, thanks. 

Crawley/Three Bridges is a possible place to move then .... or Redhill.


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## dessiato (Mar 17, 2014)

Redhill is OK but very boring. There's little to do there. But for your needs is probably OK. If I were to move back there, I'd go for somewhere like Leatherhead and buy a car. Although I realise that in your case this might not work. But Leatherhead is a nice small town, but again not a lot to do. It has the advantage of being quiet, and only about half an hour drive to Gatwick on the back roads. I's consider a small car for Gatwick from Redhill too. The independence offered would, for me at least, greatly outweigh the costs involved. Anyway you'll need one to get too and from the better shopping.


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## _pH_ (Mar 17, 2014)

If you're doing that as a regular overnight commute it's worth checking National Rail Enquiries every time as diversions/rail replacement buses/longer journeys are pretty common for overnight engineering works.


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## ska invita (Mar 17, 2014)

_pH_ said:


> If you're doing that as a regular overnight commute it's worth checking National Rail Enquiries every time as diversions/rail replacement buses/longer journeys are pretty common for overnight engineering works.


 

as Reginald D Hunter says, Britain has an amazing transport system, without doubt the best bus replacement service in the world


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## neelxxshb (Mar 18, 2014)

haha ska 
actually I work for one part of transport  tho not trains so its a alien world to me...
but I have checked and the places I can consider (with trains all night to victoria/london bridge) are Purley, Three bridges and Horley
all those 3 are fairly different..
does anyone live around there? or know someone who does? 
i went to three bridges yesterday and there is nothing much around the station unless you are prepared to go to crawley town.. I dont really want a buzz and I am happy with quite places but I would like some shops and restaurants 

but getting a car.. I am embarrassed to say but I dont know how to drive.. so that goes out of the window


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## dessiato (Mar 18, 2014)

neelxxshb said:


> haha ska
> actually I work for one part of transport  tho not trains so its a alien world to me...
> but I have checked and the places I can consider (with trains all night to victoria/london bridge) are Purley, Three bridges and Horley
> all those 3 are fairly different..
> ...


In this case I would suggest either Horley or Crawley, with, perhaps, an edge on Crawley.


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## Puddy_Tat (Mar 18, 2014)

dunno really.  there's something of a compromise between somewhere without a 'buzz' and somewhere that's unspeakably dull.

Don't know a lot about Purley or Horley / Three Bridges.

A few urbanites live in the Norwood direction - there's the night bus N68 to Croydon all night.  Alternatively, depending on just what you mean by the 'middle of the night' then the 75 bus route may be worth a look - first bus into Croydon arrives 0440, last bus from Croydon is 0120.


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## Puddy_Tat (Mar 18, 2014)

As regards Crawley, don't think there are night trains from Crawley anywhere, but bits of the Fastway bus between Crawley and gatwick runs all night


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## _pH_ (Mar 18, 2014)

I lived in Horley for 6 months many years ago - pretty dull but inoffensive. Crawley is a crap new town, bit of a shithole. If I had to choose between those two and Purley, I'd probably choose Purley.


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## Dan U (Mar 18, 2014)

Horley and Purley get the most stopping trains apart from Gatwick, as others have said. 

No point looking at Crawley really as nothing goes much past Gatwick late at night. 

If you don't mind driving to Horley and parking, your search are becomes a lot larger. There are loads of villages and small towns etc around Gatwick that are decent to live in.

ETA - just saw the no driving thing. Whoops. I'd say Purley then. Although personally I'd live in Horley before Purley every day, but I like countryside and Horley is surrounded by it.


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## neelxxshb (Mar 18, 2014)

thanks a lot for you inputs...
I am now looking at properties between purley and horley...
just those two places...
Purley puts me off because of croydon nearby... a lot of ppl in other forums have advised me that since its soo close to croydon, the trouble is now moving to purley area 
horley though might be quite but its surrounded by beautiful countryside which is nice to live around and if I want the buzz then I guess croydon is 25 mins and london about 45 mins


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## Dan U (Mar 18, 2014)

You live in North London, Purley should hold no fears for you unless you live in bloody Hampstead or somewhere. 

Some lovely countryside round Horley though, agreed.


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## sim667 (Mar 18, 2014)

_pH_ said:


> Yeah. Plus there is Gatwick Express which runs 24 hrs from Victoria and hourly stopping trains Victoria to Three Bridges.


And Horley

I live in Redhill, its a bit of a bugger to get back to in the middle of the night, just so you know.


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## neelxxshb (Mar 18, 2014)

no aint that posh lol 
i live in archway... close to hampstead tho 
I like the look of horley and its a lot cheaper compared to purley


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## sim667 (Mar 18, 2014)

neelxxshb said:


> no aint that posh lol
> i live in archway... close to hampstead tho
> I like the look of horley and its a lot cheaper compared to purley


 
Horley is quite a nice town, theres plenty of good restaurants, decent enough local services etc. For weekends beyond the pubs there's not much to do of an evening, there used to be a club, but it got shut down for problems with fights, and in all fairness we ran the last night there and it turned into a bloodbath.

Lots of nice countryside nearby, and quite a few nice towns in the form of dorking, reigate etc. Guildford is easy to get to if you drive, and both london and brighton are a piece of piss to get to on the train, but a travelcard is probably about £20 from there.

Crawley's got a cinema and bowling alley which are huge. There's also a lovely little cinema in reigate (and oxted) run by the everyman cinema company.

I live a 10 min drive from horley and have lots of freinds there, so I've got no problem if you want to tap me up for info.


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## Puddy_Tat (Mar 18, 2014)

neelxxshb said:


> I like the look of horley and its a lot cheaper compared to purley



Although be aware that the price of a season ticket to central London goes up alarmingly once you get outside the travelcard zones.


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## sim667 (Mar 18, 2014)

Puddy_Tat said:


> Although be aware that the price of a season ticket to central London goes up alarmingly once you get outside the travelcard zones.


 
From where we are it sometimes works out cheaper to get an oyster card with a season ticket from coulsdon south attached, and then buy a return to coulsdon south.


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## ska invita (Mar 18, 2014)

neelxxshb said:


> haha ska
> actually I work for one part of transport  tho not trains so its a alien world to me...
> but I have checked and the places I can consider (with trains all night to victoria/london bridge) are Purley, Three bridges and Horley
> all those 3 are fairly different..
> ...


im amazed by this night train thing -once the tubes start running at night it means you can probably get out to the country quicker than you can to south east london on a night bus. Keep us posted on your investigations - im planning a move this year too... Being able to go out to a club or gig in London and get home is a crucial consideration for me


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## neelxxshb (Mar 19, 2014)

thanks everyone...
I am gonna choose Horley as my first preference as the housing there is affordable and its just a 43 minutes commute into london...
it will cost me a bit more for an annual season ticket but my company will re-imburse me 75% of the ticket cost..
and whatever happens with national rail services... worse come worse they will do their best to run a service to gatwick as its a big airport... so I wont be stranded living in horley 
super excited now  

thanks again everyone..


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## sim667 (Mar 19, 2014)

The six bells is a nice pub


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