Tonight:
4°c
100,000 stranded as rail line fails for third time in week
Dick Murray, Rashid Razaq and Anna Davis7 Jan 2009
BRITAIN'S busiest railway was in meltdown today with trains in and out of Euston brought to a virtual standstill.
More than 100,000 commuters were urged not to use the West Coast mainline to and from London after power lines collapsed, bringing major disruption for the sixth day in a row.
Network Rail was slammed by passengers and train operators. It was accused of reopening the line "too soon" after a £9billion rebuilding programme.
Virgin Trains boss Sir Richard Branson was said to be "incandescent with rage" because of the repeated fiascos.
Hundreds of passengers spent two hours stuck on freezing trains last night after power lines north of Wembley collapsed when an express passed under them. Staff handed out blankets to shivering customers as the temperature plunged to -9C outside.
The collapse brought services to Euston to a halt. All Virgin and London Midland services were cancelled and only London overground services to Watford were operating - leaving tens of thousands of passengers stranded.
The failure astonished rail industry insiders as it was the third time the line has been brought to its knees in less than a week. On Friday a light plane crash beside the railway in Staffordshire brought down overhead power lines, resulting in disruption all weekend. On Sunday evening, just as services were supposed to be recovering, more power lines came down close to Watford Junction, causing disruption for Monday morning commuters which lasted all day.
The latest problem began at 8.40 last night when a Virgin Pendolino from Euston to Wolverhampton lost power just after North Wembley.
Its overhead pantograph, which supplies it with electricity, dragged down the 25 kilovolt cables, cutting all power. Every electric train in the area was halted with no heating and only emergency lighting.
More than 100 passengers on the Pendolino shivered in sub-zero temperatures before being walked along the tracks to safety.
Network Rail promised a full-scale inquiry. The taxpayer-funded body faces paying tens of millions of pounds in compensation to Virgin Trains and London Midland and the British Chambers of Commerce claimed that chaos has cost business a "shocking" £38 million. Director general David Frost said: "Network Rail must ensure that there is a rapid and effective improvement in the reliability of the network."
The situation is a massive embarrassment to NR. It was keen to bring in a new timetable with 1,100 more services each week even though Sir Richard made a public appeal to NR to delay introducing the new timetables until May to allow further testing of the line.
NR has also reduced speed limits along the line to 110mph from 125mph and a spokesman insisted that "the limit is for today only". Also, all Virgin services to Euston today were being stopped at Milton Keynes and all London Midland Trains were stopping and starting at Hemel Hempstead. Coaches were running between Euston, Watford, Milton Keynes and Hemel Hempstead.
Reader views (32)
£38bn lost, £10m in compensation. Nothing to me (I use Oyster).
Whoever plans contingency at NR for disasters needs to perceive that even after penalties, the country is £37.999B out of pocket.
This clearly shows how depenedent we are on trains in London, and how little regard there is for the financial impact of these disasters.
- Jeminar, Watford, Hertfordshire, 07/01/2009 22:30
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Just wondered if all the problems were the same reason?? Network rail is keeping very quiet about what actually occurred. If the Pantographs are bringing down the wires then this could be the end of Overhead as we know it!! Not really it seems that the "" new "" wiring is not up to the job so we will have another year of closure so it can be replaced...
I noted the Network rail site last night suggested you used London Buses to Watford ( four changes and 2 hours) yet there is a service from Euston Square to Watford by the good old Metropolitian why did this not get shown.
Sad times we live in as we have people who seem to want to save money by using poor materials and we take the consequences
- David Wootton, tamworth UK, 07/01/2009 21:46
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Spare diesels? asked Robert from London.
Look at your local preserved railway where you will find dozens of diesel locomotives that have been recovered from scrapyards and rebuilt by volunteers. All because the 'big' railway didn't need them. Several are being, or have been, hired back to 'help' on the Channel Tunnel Rail Link and other projects. Spare is not in the dictionary of Rail operatots, who have to justify the need for each item of rolling stock used.
A total shambles.
- Frank N, Ellesmere Port ,England, 07/01/2009 20:33
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BJ, comment of the day!
- Kate, London, 07/01/2009 16:26
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"I have had a rail service which has improved massively over the last few years."
I absolutely second this. That said, the improvements on my line only started when Southern took over from Connex a few years ago, but they were rapid and dramatic, to the extent that serious delays are virtually unknown and almost invariably due to things the company has no control over (suicides, landslides, lorries hitting bridges and the like).
And the mere fact that Connex could lose its franchise thanks to poor performance shows a major advantage of the present system - under British Rail, you just had to lump it. And we did!
- Michael, London, 07/01/2009 16:22
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This country is falling apart. We need some proper people in charge.
- Georgie, Islington, London, 07/01/2009 15:23
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And you want to let this Network Rail shower build Crossrail? I would not trust them with wiring a mains plug !
Far better to let the French or the Germans build the Crossrail railway system for us - it will at least work !
- Off The Rails, London, England, 07/01/2009 14:42
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My dad worked for a subcontractor on the Western line doing upgrades in the 90s. He came in half way through the project and during a meeting noticed that while they had made plans for moving the track.....they hadn't made plans for moving the overhead wires. Doh. Needless to say, although he lived in the South East and worked in Birmingham, he never took his own train line to work but drove instead.
- Name Withheld, London, 07/01/2009 14:06
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The original London to Bristol railway was built in broad gauge (2.14m). When it became neccessary to re-engineer it to standard gauge in the late 19th century this was achieved in one long weekend! Now, I suspect it would take 5 - 7 years. There are two main problems. 
There is far too much sub-contracting so that nobody ends up owning a problem. This also results in inflated costs because endless middlemen take a cut! (ii) Poor project management. These days a project manager is most likely to be a graduate who after a years work experience goes on to get an MBA. Those with real experience tend to be ignored as being negative with the result that things usually overrun and do not work on day one! Overall this does not bode well for the Olympics. Will the various station and infrastructure upgrades be completed on time. I suspect (it's probably a certainty) that they will not!
- Michael, London, 07/01/2009 13:54
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Must be something very wrong with the overhead wires to keep causing this. Least on Southeastern we have the 3rd rail and this can't happen!
What I don't understand though is why they can't use diesels to "rescue" these eletric trains and provide a standby service albeit much reduced while repairs are carried out.
- Robert, London, 07/01/2009 13:38
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I am one of those unfortunate people that have to endure the second rate service London Midland are providing. Practically every day there is some sort of problem, usuallly due to a member of staff not being available. Fortunatly I have the back-up of a tube service, otherwise I would not have been able to get to work today. Enough is enough and I urge everyone to complain to the Minister of transport. London Midland deserve to lose their contract.
- Triffidqueen, Desk in London, 07/01/2009 13:28
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I am from Africa and I cant believe that this is supposed to be a first world country! Maybe you should take a leaf out of SA's book...
- Tia Miller, coventry, UK, 07/01/2009 13:18
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Well folks it hasn't been any better up here at the "other end" of the West Coast Main Line - not only have our fares gone up, but there have been engineering overruns, a brand new signalling system that Network Rail has spent hundreds of millions on that keeps breaking down and even the odd power failure or two.
You may pray for this ludicrous structure to be abandoned and for the Gov't to renationalise (or at the very least, reintegrate) but they have their heads so far up their backsides it ain't gonna happen.
- Derek, Glasgow, Scotland, 07/01/2009 13:14
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And guess what Netowrk Rail (a public body) will be fined by the Strategic Rail Authority (another public body) so no progress will be achieved whatsoever and tha ssame old hands will collect their pay at the end of the month....
- Wallytrader, London, 07/01/2009 13:11
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I have had a rail service which has improved massively over the last few years.
Those who claim things were better under BR clearly didn't have to cram into the guard van every morning on services running two hours late like we had on the Bexleyheath line in the 80's, or get the 02:30 mail train from London Bridge because the last commuter train left before 11.
Still you can't sell newspapers with a headline saying that hundreds of thousands of commuters had no problems getting into work on the trains today.
- Ian, London, 07/01/2009 13:10
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How much did the fare increases go up by?
Labour allow these corporate thieves to rob us blind, pathetic.
- Frank, Home Counties, England., 07/01/2009 13:01
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I have been using this route for the last 10 years and the service has massively improved in this time. The trains are newer and cleaner, the journey time reduced by more than an hour and delays are far less frequent. Off course we don't get to hear about any of this, we only get to hear about it when things go wrong so we can all have a good old collective moan. After all moaning is the one thing we really do excel at in this country.
- Nj, london, 07/01/2009 13:01
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The truly laughable thing is that the millions of pounds levied in fines will be paid for by US!
I really hope Branson can bring some of the idiots running the maintenance work and day-to-day running to book....
- Neil, london, 07/01/2009 12:30
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Where is Mussolini when you need him?
- Bj, London, 07/01/2009 12:28
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The Autumn Leaves drift by my window
I'll stay in bed - the trains won't run
Socialist Britain - just like Putin it's just a front
- James, London UK, 07/01/2009 12:18
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Trains have been severely disrupted in many other locations since New Year - but there's been very little coverage of it, since it's more or less "normal" at this time of year. At the same time, Europe's most expensive railway became even more expensive. There is an absolute political and economic case for the railways to be renationalised. The current system is a total shambles and is costing the country, and individual travellers, dear. Never mind Branson's bleating; he milks his customers for every penny they have, yet his service is now running at <30% punctuality. BR was bad, but never this bad.
- Steven Davidson, Colchester, England, 07/01/2009 12:15
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...'They didn't give us any hot food or drink on the train, just chocolate bars.'... Hold on, what exactly was the reason for the train stopping again, no electricity?
- Jess, London, 07/01/2009 12:04
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The service gets worse and worse. It was obvious that the new timetable was going to overload the network, which was struggling last year. If the overhead wiring can't cope can they be sure the points system will cope with the ever increasing number of Virgin trains? Why they implement these timetable changes at this time of year is beyond me! A disaster is waiting to happen.
- David, Leighton Buzzard, 07/01/2009 11:57
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These problems never occurred to such an extent when the railway was under British Rail and I should know as I travelled on the West Coast Mainline throughout the 60's, 70's and 80's. Bring back British Rail!
- Paul Hopkins, London, England, 07/01/2009 11:45
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Well worth the inflation busting fares rises then! Network Rail couldn't run a tap let alone a rail system. It's all part of the shocking decline in standards in this country, it has excelerated under the current rabble which passes for govt. Everywhere you look you've got shabby service, cheap repairs, ill equipped armed forces, councils who are more interested in fining people for putting the wrong refuse in the wrong bin or hounding motorists with parking fines whilst the services they are supposed to be providing are being cut, halved or just not being done. Branson and the rail co's are at the mercy of what is a re-invention of the old BR, tax funded and useless with top management rewarding themselves for failure just like our useless MP's, 'top' civil servants, council leaders and quango heads like OFWAT, OFSTED, OFTEL, FSA etc etc.
It's the overstretched and overtaxed workers who are having to pay for all this, no doubt including the £millions in compensation to the rail co's and it has got to stop before we are a third rate third world basket case like Zimbabwe!
- Ed, Hants, 07/01/2009 11:37
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Another example of modern society's ineptitude at real engineering, dumbing down appears to be everywhere now.
The Victorian engineers would not have had this scale of stupidity and incompetence.
- David Smith, London UK, 07/01/2009 11:19
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Yet again, the ineptitude of the privitised railway system has been brought into the public once more. When will this useless Government ever learn? There are far too many companies operating in the railway industry, which means that there is not a cohesive management structure, which in turn allows the numerious and embarrassing fiasco's to take place. It is little wonder that our travelling public have to endure such appalling rail journeys. Come back Stephenson and Brunel, we need you more then ever.
- Keith L Mason, Watford UK., 07/01/2009 11:17
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when it comes to London Transport system, if your travelling from london to manchester and a bird lands on a track in Peckham it will delay your journey to manchester by 2 hours. It seems to be very sill to operate a transport system like a scalextric track. One part goes then the whole thing goes.
- Joe, london, 07/01/2009 10:59
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Hi
None of these stories surprise me.
It's all part of the pattern to life itself.
It's all a down and up cycle, both in minor and major
ways.
Currently, due to this basic " don't care" attitude of everybody, it's going downhill.
The only time it will change is when, collectively, we all come to our senses and realise that we need to stop
having a go at each other, make common sence a priority
and start to get our prorities right.
Empires come and go.
There's only one direction to go in from the peak and that's down.
Money became God.
People were not important.
It's now changing naturally.
Barry.
- Barry Watson, Westerham Kent, 07/01/2009 10:47
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This unfortunately happens all the time on this line and with increasing regularity. The recovery plan for such a situation is frequently non existent. In the summer I was onboard a London Midland service that brought overhead lines down just north of Wembley. In the 2.5 hours that we were stranded, passengers in the 8 car train were crammed in to half the train to find that the problem was still not resolved. After the 2.5 hours passed we were finally transferred to a rescue train that butted up to the stranded train.
National Rail have got to fix the problems with the overhead lines and work with the train companies to put better recovery processes in place.
- Mark G, Buckingham, UK, 07/01/2009 10:45
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Glad to see all the "so-called investment" is paying off!
One of these days we'll have reliable & affordable travel...ok, maybe not - but we can all dream!
- Scott, London, 07/01/2009 10:40
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Surprise surprise, public transport incompetence... poor old Branson!
- Damian, Croydon, 07/01/2009 10:38
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