Brighton Pride 2026
Saturday 1 and Sunday 2 August
We’re really excited to be working with Brighton & Hove Pride once again, to help people travel to and from this spectacular weekend of celebration and protest, which takes place on Saturday 1 and Sunday 2 August.
With huge numbers of people expected, we’ll be running more services and putting on extra carriages. However, our stations and trains right across the network will be extremely busy, especially on the Saturday.
Please plan ahead and allow extra time for your journeys. We also suggest you re-check your journeys immediately before travelling for any on-the-day alterations.
To help you prepare for your journeys to and from Brighton, here are some things to bear in mind:
- If travelling to or from any of the Pride events in the city, you’ll need to use Brighton station. London Road and Preston Park stations will be closed from 17:00 on Friday 31 July for the whole weekend. They will both re-open from the start of services on Monday 3 August.
- Remember that Oyster cards and Contactless payments are not valid for journeys to and from Brighton.
- You must have a valid train ticket for your entire journey. We strongly advise buying your rail tickets in advance, including for your return journey home, as there may be long queues to purchase them on the day.
- Ticket checks will be in operation. If using barcode e-tickets on mobile phones, you’ll need to be able to show the ticket, so please ensure your device has enough battery.
- Because of the large crowds who will be leaving Brighton after Pride, give yourself at least an hour to get back to Brighton station from any of the festival sites, or the seafront.
- The rear entrance at Brighton station (Stroudley Road) will be closed. To get into the station please use the main front entrance on Queens Road.
- Working with Pride, Brighton & Hove City Council and the Police, for everyone’s safety we implement a rainbow queuing system on the approach to the station, to direct everyone leaving the city into the right queue for your train and destination:
- Purple queue is for trains on the West Coastway, for stations towards Shoreham-by-Sea, Worthing, Barnham, Chichester and beyond.
- Blue queue for trains on the Brighton Main Line, for stations towards Haywards Heath, Gatwick Airport and to London
- Green queue is for trains on the East Coastway, for stations towards Lewes, Seaford and Eastbourne
- For safety reasons, please don’t bring glass bottles or containers into the station or on to our trains.
- Make sure you know the times of your late evening trains home and give yourself plenty of extra time, bearing in mind you will have to queue to get into the station and on to trains.
Plan and check your journeys at nationalrail.co.uk
There’s more information and advice on the Pride website.
One last thing
if you’re watching the parade, look out for our ‘Somewhere over the Trainbow’ themed float, featuring colleagues from our LGBT+ Employee Network.
From all of us here at Southern, wishing you a safe and FABULOUS Pride!
Other major events taking place
There are number of other major events taking place across the Southern network over the same weekend as Brighton Pride.
On Friday 31 July, Nick Cave and The Bad Seeds are playing at Preston Park. Trains to and from Brighton will be much busier. For further information about travel to and from this event, please visit this page.
On Saturday 1 August, racing at Goodwood is taking place, meaning trains to and from Chichester will also be much busier than usual. Our revised train service plans in place for Brighton Pride have been devised to also support people getting to and from the racing event.
If you’re heading to Goodwood, for speedier journeys buy your rail tickets before you travel and be prepared for queues to board trains, so please allow additional time.