Action Promised Following Elizabeth Line Fiasco
Re-examination of problems after passengers stranded for three hours
Passengers being escorted off the stricken train
December 14, 2023
Local users of the western branch of the Elizabeth line may have more hope of action being taken to improve services after a recent embarrassing fiasco.
Passengers using stations such as Ealing, Hanwell and Acton Mainline have long been complaining about the reliability of the service which was meant to be transformative for the area. TfL response to complaints was often deemed to be dismissive and patronising.
In addition to the problems experience by Elizabeth line passengers, those using Great Western Railway services in the area have reported a severe deterioration in reliability since the Elizabeth Line came into operation.
TfL promised improvements from this May and November due to track and signal upgrades but the problems came to a head with an incident last Thursday (7 December) in which hundreds of passengers were stranded for over three hours.
The failure of overhead power cables near Ladbroke Grove at around 6.30pm led to a train out of Paddington suddenly coming to a halt before it got to Acton Mainline station. Passengers reported a tense atmosphere in the packed train with the only information coming from the driver who was unable to give a full picture of what happened. Among those on board was TV presenter Rachel Riley and singer James Blung. Half way through the ordeal, the backup power for lighting and heating failed. Eventually those on board had to be led back down along the tracks.
Rachel Riley posted a picture on social media of herself trapped on the train
It is understood that the persistent reliability problems that are occurring on the section of the line between Paddington and Ealing are due to the electricity supply not having been designed for a Metro style service like the Elizabeth line. The infrastructure is owned and operated, not by TfL, but Network Rail and was installed with the less regular Great Western Railway services in mind. In the most recent incident which involved the long delay to passengers, it us understood that the overhead cables were damaged by a train from another operator.
The incident has focused attention on the problems and a wider institutional acknowledgement that the previous complaints from passengers have been justified.
The Great Western line is now subject of an investigation by the regulator the Office of Rail and Road.
Sadiq Khan has written to Andrew Haines, the managing director of Network Rail, to say the "the reliability of the Elizabeth line has not been good enough".
A Network Rail spokesperson said, "The whole industry response wasn't good enough and we will learn from this," adding that £3billion had been invested in upgrading the track infrastructure in London.
The TfL board met this Wednesday (13 December) to discuss the matter at which TfL commissioner, Andrew Lord, said Network Rail was reviewing the response to the overhead cable damage while TfL was looking into the response given to passengers.
The Mayor said, "Londoners and others are rightly frustrated by the recent delays, cancellations and at times inadequate customer communication."
He continued that the extra demand for public transport generated by the Elizabeth Line put undue pressure on the rest of the network on the regular occasions it wasn’t functioning properly.
Usage of the service continues to grow, despite the problems and it reached a new record level for passenger numbers earlier this month with 769,000 journeys recorded on Wednesday 6 December. However, the most recent figures from the Office of Rail show that currently the Elizabeth line has the highest number of train cancellations in the country.
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