Trains to Chessington South

Chessington's rise as a commuter town began in 1927. The opening of the Kingston bypass brought new housing to the fields around the town, and the arrival of rail a decade later spurred yet more development. Today the town is best known for Chessington World of Adventures, Greater London's only theme park, with in excess of two million visitors a year. The park includes the much older Chessington Zoo, which sent a baby elephant to attend the opening of the station back in 1939. Despite Chessington South's distance from London - nearly 14 miles - it sits within Travelcard Zone 6, and serves a steady stream of commuters to the capital, with trains to London Waterloo every half hour. The line was originally meant to extend south to Leatherhead, but WW2 intervened - today you can still see a set of disused tracks runing beyond the station into Ashtead Common Wood.