Daisy Cooper, MP for St Albans, has issued a stark warning that Thameslink is set to exceed its current capacity within 5 years’ time, due to mounting pressures on the Bedford to Brighton line.
This concerning revelation was made during a meeting Daisy held with Thameslink and Network Rail bosses in Parliament in January 2026, as part of her long-standing work pressing them to improve train services for St Albans residents.
The pressures in question are set to result from the expansion of Luton airport, the construction of a new Universal Studios theme park in Bedford, the Strategic Rail Freight Interchange in Park Street, St Albans, alongside a number of new big local housing developments which will need to be delivered to meet the government’s bigger housing targets.
Taken together, this will significantly raise demand on the line, so Daisy has challenged Thameslink and Network Rail on how they plan to cope with this.
The former Conservative government neglected the opportunity to address this pending capacity crisis by sitting on fully costed plans to increase capacity and improve reliability on the line for more than two years.1
However, Network Rail and Thameslink have assured Daisy that they are currently drawing up new plans to expand capacity – through changes to the timetable, using more of the longer 12-carriage trains and infrastructure improvements in the Croydon area – which will be submitted to the government by this summer.
These plans will require significant government investment if they are to be delivered and Daisy has pledged to campaign for that investment with urgency. She said:
“The Labour government must not make the same mistake as the Conservatives, and sit by whilst pressures mount on our Thameslink services.
“Following their decisions to give Luton airport expansion the go-ahead and impose flawed top-down housing targets, the government must act ahead of this pending deadline, to ensure St Albans residents can access the train services they need.
“Once a proposal to increase capacity has been submitted, I’ll be doing all I can to ensure the government funds it.
“I’ll be writing to all MPs up and down the Bedford to Brighton line asking them to join me in this fight to expand Thameslink capacity, before it’s too late.”
1Source: https://www.networkrail.co.uk/our-work/our-routes/sussex/brighton-main-line-upgrade-proposals/
Daisy meeting with Network Rail and Thameslink bosses in Parliament, in January 2026.