Mayor demands answers after days of Piccadilly travel chaos
Problems with overhead lines left hundreds of passengers stranded on Thursday with repairs still ongoing
Andy Burnham has written to Network Rail demanding answers after days of disruption at Manchester Piccadilly following a fault with overhead line equipment.
The Mayor of Greater Manchester said the scale and timing of the disruption was concerning, coming just months after what had been described as a once in a generation upgrade to infrastructure at the station.
What happened at Manchester Piccadilly
Services to and from Manchester Piccadilly were severely disrupted on Thursday 16th April after overhead line problems left passengers stranded.
According to the letter, the issue began late in the morning when “an overhead line dewirements causing wires to become wrapped around an Avanti West Coast train”.
Network Rail worked with Transport for Greater Manchester to allow ticket acceptance on Bee Network services while engineers began repairs.
Burnham said “I am thankful for the speedy manner in which Network Rail engaged TfGM’s Operational Control Centre to stand up ticket acceptance on Bee Network services, testament to the collective efforts Network Rail and TfGM have made in joint working to address customer disruption.”
By Thursday evening, the train had been removed and temporary repairs were underway, with full repairs expected by Saturday evening.
However, Burnham said he was “disappointed to discover on the morning of Friday 17 April that repairs had not gone well, with an overrun until 9am causing severe impacts to services in and out of Piccadilly.”
He said ‘the timing and delay to the repairs is extremely concerning.’
Burnham also questioned how the fault could happen so soon after the recent blockade at Piccadilly station.
He said ‘It is furthermore concerning that this OLE incident should occur so soon after the Ardwick blockade earlier this year.’
He added that he had understood the work to be significant, saying it was ‘a once in a generation closure of Piccadilly station to renew and upgrade the infrastructure, delivered successfully and on schedule.’
Call for full explanation from Network Rail
The Mayor has asked for a detailed account of what caused the fault and why repairs took longer than expected.
He said ‘Whilst I appreciate the ongoing efforts of your team to respond to this incident, I would like a full explanation as to how this incident occurred, the reasons behind the delays to the repairs, how and why this was not mitigated by works undertaken during the Ardwick blockade, and assurance that Network Rail are taking the full and necessary precautions to ensure that the risk of such an incident happening again is minimised to its fullest extent.’
He said ‘this once again gives me cause for concern that the ageing rail infrastructure in Greater Manchester is not fit for purpose for a modern railway.’
The letter was addressed to Network Rail’s chief executive Jeremy Westlake and copied to Alex Hynes.
Network Rail says services are now mostly back to normal, although some repair work is still ongoing.