"Andrew Heenan" wrote

Thameslink already has two quite separate services, the metro (via the
Sutton Loop), and the Bedford to Brighton. It would make perfect sense for
LOROL to control the metro service, but not the long distance. LOROL would
then take a chair at the timetabling meetings and negotiate paths liek
everyone else. LOROL can share lines with other services just like the
other TOCs do.


But then that doesn't solve the revenue allocation question, which is what
this discussion is about, it just moves it.

You have even more shared journeys between the privately owned and run
Bedford to Brighton service and the TfL service.

What's more, it is then in the interests of the privately run Bedford trains
to stop at, say, Mill Hill, Hendon, West Hampstead, and Kentish Town, for
example, purely to share in the revenue from those stations, even though
that pattern isn't optimal for anyone outside of Greater London.