East Coastway line

East Coastway line
Lewes railway station on 15 July 2003 – looking east
Overview
Type	Heavy rail
System	National Rail
Status	Operational
Locale	East Sussex, South East England
Termini	Brighton Hastings
Stations	17
Operation
Opened	1846
Owner	Network Rail
Operator(s)	Southern Southeastern
Depot(s)	Eastbourne St Leonards
Rolling stock	Class 171 "Turbostar" Class 313 Class 375 "Electrostar" Class 377 "Electrostar" Class 442 "Wessex Electric"
Technical
Number of tracks	two
Track gauge	1,435 mm (4 ft 8 1⁄2 in) standard gauge
Electrification	750 V DC Third rail
Operating speed	90 mph (145 km/h) maximum

The East Coastway line is a railway line along the south coast of Sussex and Kent to the east of Brighton, England. Trains to the West of Brighton operate on the West Coastway line.

The train operating company Southern (formerly South Central Trains) refers to the routes on this line as "East Coastway" or "Coastway East". The trains running under the East Coastway name serve stations between Brighton, Lewes, Eastbourne, Hastings, Ore and Ashford, together with the branch line to Seaford. The long-closed branch to Kemptown (an area of Brighton) used to diverge just east of London Road Station.

The Brighton Main Line route to Eastbourne and Hastings, via Plumpton and Cooksbridge, shares the East Coastway line east of Lewes station, thus for completeness, the line from Lewes to Keymer Junction (where it joins the Brighton Main Line) has been included on the route map. Not included here, but having their own articles, are the Newhaven & Seaford branch and Kemp Town branch. The route has ELRs: BTL, KJE1, KJE2, KJE3, WJB and TTH. Also formerly PSC between Polegate and Stone Cross Junctions.

The Brighton Lewes and Hastings Railway was formed 7 February 1844 and received Parliamentary approval for the construction of a line between Brighton and Lewes 29 July 1844. Work was started by September, engineered by John Urpeth Rastrick, with the route crossing a valley with the London Road viaduct then running through the South Downs to Falmer before descending to Lewes, with a station at Falmer. This section opened on 8 June 1846. By 27 June 1846 a single line extension was opened to just outside Hastings at Bulverhythe with an intermediate station at Polegate to serve Eastbourne (this section was later doubled in January 1849).