GTR says bike thefts on its trains and stations fell 59% in a year, vandalism reports fell from 306 to 209 and graffiti 41%, with 110 Travel Safe Officers.
Reported bike thefts on Southern, Thameslink, Great Northern and Gatwick Express fell by 59% in a year, the operator Govia Thameslink Railway (GTR) said today. Thefts of passengers’ personal property fell by 35%, reports of vandalism and criminal damage dropped from 306 to 209, and graffiti and etching reports fell by 41%, from 252 to 147 (GTR, 20 October 2026).
GTR’s brands carry a large share of Brighton’s rail passengers: Southern runs from Brighton to London and along the Sussex coast, and Thameslink runs from Brighton through London to Bedford, Peterborough and Cambridge. The figures cover the whole network. GTR has not broken them down by station, and its release compares this year with last year without giving the dates either period covers.
What brought the numbers down, according to GTR
GTR puts the fall down to its Antisocial Behaviour Improvement Plan, launched in June 2024. Since then, it says, it has put more safety and enforcement staff where passengers can see them, worked more closely with British Transport Police (BTP) and brought in “practical crime-prevention initiatives”.
The biggest drop was in bike theft. GTR links it to its “Cycle Surgeries”, run with BTP, where commuters get crime prevention advice and free security marking for their bikes. The operator describes the marking as “a permanent, unique code added to bicycles making the item easier to recover if stolen”.
110 Travel Safe Officers
When it launched the plan in 2024, GTR said it would spend £2.5 million, put 1,542 body-worn cameras on frontline staff and double the number of Travel Safe Officers (TSOs), after a 23% rise in verbal assaults on staff and an increase of almost 10% in physical assaults the year before (GTR, 26 June 2024).
It now has 110 TSOs across the network. They work alongside its Rail Enforcement Officers, and GTR says their job is “to help and reassure passengers, whilst also deterring criminal activity”.
Some of those officers now stand at ticket gates, to stop “push throughs”, where someone without a ticket forces their way through the gate behind a paying passenger. GTR says push throughs have fallen by up to 80% in some areas of its network. It does not say which areas.
Vandalism and graffiti
GTR says it has also been working to improve “the look and feel of its trains and stations”. Reports of vandalism and criminal damage fell by nearly a third, and graffiti and etching reports by 41%.
What GTR said
Jenny Saunders, GTR’s Customer Service Director, said: “We’re serious about tackling antisocial behaviour of any kind across our network because we know how upsetting these crimes can be.
“Whilst these reductions are encouraging and show that our targeted action is making a difference, we know there is still a long way to go. I want to thank our colleagues who work tirelessly every day to make our network safe and would encourage customers to continue reporting crime and antisocial behaviour on our network, so we can work together to keep these numbers moving in the right direction.”
What it means for you
- If you leave a bike at a station, look out for GTR’s Cycle Surgeries with BTP. They offer free security marking, which GTR says makes a stolen bike easier to recover. GTR has not said where the next ones will be held.
- If you see crime or antisocial behaviour on a train or at a station, GTR is asking passengers to keep reporting it, so staff and police know where to go.
- Expect to see more staff at the gates. Travel Safe Officers are there to deter push throughs and to help passengers.
For this week’s engineering works and closures, see our Brighton roadworks and travel page.
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