Railway Telegraph, Thornton Heath

This is a Young's house, but with only the one ale on - Young's Bitter of course (£1.50 a half). I didn't see any sign of menus or food at Wednesday lunchtime. This is a two-room pub, with what must be the public bar (it contains the dartboard) in a completely separate room on the right, with the saloon bar/lounge on the left. This latter room has a couple of tall tables/tall stools at the front by the windows, some sofas scattered around the place, but with enough banquettes and normal tables and chairs. This is quite a large room - bare-boarded at the front, stretching back past and to the left of the bar counter to a carpeted area, and with a stage at the far end with a trio of sofas on it. There was a sign to a patio garden at the back, but I didn't see a need to investigate it. There are still some original features remaining, such as the etched/glazed vestibule, the bar counter, and matchboard and fielded paneling on some of the walls. This is a decent and comfortable enough pub, still retaining a pubby atmosphere, although the ale selection (or lack of it) was a bit disappointing.

Railway Telegraph pages at the Youngs site - www.youngs.co.uk

The Railway Telegraph is quite close to Thornton Heath train station,when i went in this pub it was painted red all over making it stand out quite well. The pub did'nt open untill 12.00 so i left this one till last while on my short Thornton Heath crawl,once inside i went in the room at the front which was a fairly basic bar that had normal tables and chairs. This pub is a Youngs tied house and there were two real ales on the bar i had a drink of Youngs bitter and this was a nice drink the other beer was Youngs Special. The pub was very quiet on my saturday dinner visit but i was happy enough having a drink in here. Pub visited 3/9/2005

This is a decent sized Young’s house on the busy Thornton Heath High Street. The pub has been knocked about quite a bit over the years, but still retains separate rooms in places, including a small public bar at the front of the pub with decent seating and a dartboard. The main bar has a wooden floor and red panelled walls with some decent patterned wallpaper above. The bar counter runs in a U shape with high tables and stools opposite at the bottom end of the U and standard seating elsewhere in the room. As with just about every pub in Thornton Heath, there are numerous TV screens showing At the Races although the sound was turned down in favour of quiet pop music. The pub has a few decent features such as a few bits of etched glasswork, especially around the doorways and a marble fireplace with a nicely framed mirror above. However, none of this makes up for the travesty of the rear room, which has been turned into a VIP drinking area of the sort you might expect in an Essex nightclub. Heavy curtains screen the space from the view of less important people, but you can’t really avoid it as you have to pass through if you want to use the toilets. The room is very dark, with large U shaped banquettes, fancy drapes and a raised seating area at the far end as well as a DJ booth and another TV screen. You can also reach a garden patio and covered smoking area from here. There was no real ale on the bar when I arrived, but the barmaid was so slow that by the time she got around to serving me, her colleague had successfully managed to get two beers on – Young’s Ordinary and Wells Bombardier. The Ordinary was okay, but quality wasn’t as good as in the other nearby Young’s pub, the Lord Napier. A strange place this one – I can’t begin to imagine who would use the VIP area, although there was a fairly decent crowd in by the time I left on my Friday early evening visit. The nearby ‘Spoons has the better beer choice, whilst the Thomas Farley has the better interior – this pub would be my third choice on this particular High Street.

Railway Telegraph pages at the Youngs site - www.youngs.co.uk