Afternoon:
14°c
Tubes and buses running but more disruption on the trains
Dick Murray and Rashid Razaq04.02.09
THOUSANDS of London mainline rail commuters suffered a third day of disruption today.
There were cancellations, delays and shorter trains than usual — although the Tube and buses were back working at last.
London's transport bosses have been warned that commuters will not accept a repeat of the chaos despite forecasters predicting further snow storms this week.
Southern, which operates services from the south coast into London Bridge and Victoria, cancelled 22 trains and First Great Western's service between Paddington and Greenford remained suspended while other of its services between London and the Thames Valley were cancelled.
Southeastern, the busiest commuter operator, serving Kent and south-east London into Cannon Street, Charing Cross and Victoria — and which cancelled all services on Monday — reported trains virtually back to normal.
Buses replaced trains on the Bromley North to Grove Park branch line because the tracks were iced over.
Motoring groups, campaigners and politicians lambasted bus and rail chiefs for failing to keep routes running and said authorities should “learn their lessons”.
There have also been calls for a full-scale inquiry into why roads were not gritted and why the transport network seized up. Transport for London chiefs are to be quizzed over Monday's shutdown when all of London's buses were taken off the roads.
The AA, RAC and passenger group, London Travelwatch, called for measures to be taken to ensure buses, trains and the Tube do not come to a standstill twice in one week.
Edmund King, AA president, said: “There's no excuse not to keep the key bus routes moving. We can't be burned twice. If there is a forecast for extreme weather, there needs to be a co-ordinated response so key services are maintained on red routes.”
London Travelwatch revealed TfL would be asked to explain why there was such an extensive shutdown. A spokesman said: “TfL have said they did grit the roads on Sunday but it snowed again and the gritters couldn't get back to the depot. We will investigate this.”
Labour's transport chairman on the London Assembly, Val Shawcross, said: “TfL … must co-ordinate with councils for early and heavy gritting on important strategic bus routes.”
TfL refused to rule out more disruption with another six inches of snow forecast by the Met Office. A spokesman said: “TfL will … do all we can to help prevent significant disruption.”
TFL: NO REFUNDS FOR MONDAY
BUS and Tube passengers will not be refunded for Monday's travel chaos, although suburban train commuters are in line for compensation.
Transport for London said the collapse had been beyond its control. A spokesman added: “With around 10 million daily journeys, providing refunds on this scale would be a massive cost which would be borne by taxpayers.”
Labour's transport spokeswoman Val Shawcross said: “The Mayor was quick to offer a [congestion charge] refund to motorists, he should be giving equal treatment to bus and Tube users.”
Train travellers forced to abandon journeys before they boarded are entitled to a full refund.
Reader views (6)
this doesn't say whether buses still run in Derbyshire
- Stephen, Alfreton
Andrew, London - very easy to blame the drivers, but they were not responsible for Monday's weather.
At my company, ALL the staff reported for duty as normal.
Not one person refused to travel in due to the weather.
Some people travelled for hours, but none turned around and went home to play "snowballs".
Typical British blame-game. Always targetting the wrong people.
- Jim, London, UK
My tube journey on Monday evening was delayed by a driver leaving his train at Knightsbridge - it had absolutely nothing to do with the weather. Typical of TfL to try to wriggle out of compensation. I bet all the work-shy bus drivers get full pay for a day plating snowballs outside their depot.
If TfL are serious, then Commissioner Hendy should lose a day's pay for failing to provide any transport.
- Andrew, London
This comment was on the South Eastern Train's website today - 'Due to the disruption there will be several trains that are shorter than their usual length this morning - so it's likely that services will be busy.' Obviously they are not running trains on time. Their website yesterday stated that trains were running to Charing Cross Station when there were none. As per usual none of the station staff were very helpful. It just makes it more frustrating the journey and there were flared tempers due to the fact that people were trying to get home on shorter trains, which were running less frequently.
- JK, Kent
LONDON BUSES A POEM BY JOHN GRIMMETT
Our buses once used to be our pride
with the conductor shouting room for 2 inside
Even running world war 1 in France
Avoiding bombs and bullets taking a chance
Even in the smogs of years gone by
They never stopped for snow in the sky
Perhaps they were built a little stronger
To last that bit longer
Whatever it must make us all think
The British spirit is well and truly down the sink
- JOHN GRIMMETT, NEWARK ENGLAND
As bad as it is for London, I worked in your city till last summer, it seems like a joke what happend with the transport system. Whole Switzerland, southern Germany and Austria would be without public transport for months every year in winter.
- Oliver Wurzer, Salzburg, Austria
