Holloway Road Station. Image: Ellie-Eve Bennett
By Chiara Brett, Ellie-Eve Bennett, Ashir Matadi, Sara Fernandez Leon and Becky Chesson
Islington locals on Tuesday complained about snafus on London tube lines, following severe delays to commuters, which had a huge impact on businesses in Islington.
Signal faults on the Northern Line yesterday resulted in a severe buildup of commuters all over London. With services only running once every 15 minutes and an astronomic number of passengers waiting on the platform, the public were not impressed with the lack of communication or answers.
TFL advised commuters to “avoid the Northern line where possible” but have not provided any further comments.
One local business owner, Ram, who works at Kioskey+ on Holloway Road, says, “The delays are constant. On the weekends, the delays made me late to opening the shop, customers complain and were left frustrated because I couldn’t get the shop to on time.”
Michael Hall, who works for TFL at Holloway Road Station, told Holloway Express: “Delays happen every day, it’s not something we can control.” He added, “90% of the time this station operates smoothly.”
Most of the time the delays on the tube and train systems are the result of signal failures, which are traffic light devices that tell a train driver if it is safe to proceed along the tracks. “The traffic light systems are not something that we can always control,” Hall explained, as the systems operate on their own and will shut down if there is a problem which causes the red light for the driver.
Signal fault at Stockwell
A London Underground intern stated that the delays were due to a signal fault at Stockwell yesterday morning, which led to a backlog of services running. “These signal faults can spiral into severe delays quickly as the timings of tubes running are very calculated,” said the intern, who did not want to provide her name. The failure is thought to be caused by faulty wiring but is yet to be officially confirmed.
Whilst talking about yesterday’s rail disruption, Zais Mistry, manager at the National Rail Enquiry Centre, told Holloway Express, “The issue was identified early and announced at 4:54 a.m. so passengers could plan their journeys. Our engineers worked through the night, and all services are now running as normal.”
Service information board inside Holloway Road Station. Image: Ellie-Eve Bennett
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