Tube delays: Commuters face Victoria Line chaos after Finsbury Park fire alert

A fire alert at Finsbury Park has led to rush hour havoc on the Tube today as the Victoria Line was partly suspended, while a signal failure disrupted Piccadilly Line passengers.

Commuters face a miserable journey to work with no Victoria Line service between King’s Cross SAt Pancras and Walthamstow Central as Transport for London (*TfL) responded to the alert.

And severe delays were affecting the rest of the Victoria Line. However, the incidents were resolved by 11am and the Victoria Line was running a normal service.

Piccadilly Line commuters face no service between Northfields and all Heathrow terminals while TfL attempted to solve a signal failure at Boston Manor.

By 11am severe delays affected the line between Acton Town and Heathrow and Uxbridge. Minor delays affected Tube trains between Cockfosters and Acton Town.

A TfL spokesperson said: “We apologise to Victoria and Piccadilly line customers who faced disruption to their journeys this morning. This was caused by a now-extinguished trackside fire at Finsbury Park and a signal failure at Boston Manor. The Victoria line will be returning to a normal service soon and our engineers are working as quickly as possible at Boston Manor to restore a normal Piccadilly line service.”

Commuters took to Twitter as the delay disrupted Friday’s morning rush hour.

One user, Louise Gookey, said – perhaps lightheartedly – that there was “chaos in east London” with the Victoria Line down.

And as the UK prepares to leave the EU at 11pm tonight, TfL said it would have to blame Brexit for the delays.

TfL strikes coincide with Victoria Line disruption

The Victoria Line disruption occurred the same day as essential TfL staff went on a 24-hour strike over a pay dispute.

Hundreds of Tube and travel staff – including 300 Dial-a-Ride workers and 300 TfL ticket inspectors and other officials – started the strike today.

They will also take action on 28 February, 27 March and 24 April.

The union Unite has accused TfL of “botching” pay talks with workers. And it warned of further strikes if TfL does not return to the negotiating table.

Unite regional officer, Simon McCartney said: “The anger of TfL workers is turning into action. They are fighting back against paltry pay. Unless TfL bosses rethink their decision to impose a real terms pay cut the dispute could escalate further.

“TfL managers have backed themselves into a corner by refusing to meet Unite at Acas. This is a request which is never normally refused by TfL when workers are in dispute,” Unite regional officer Simon McCartney said.

“What is clear is that TfL have botched these pay talks and they are trying to cover their tracks by refusing to negotiate, hoping the issue will go away.

“Instead, Unite is now preparing to ballot  workers at Victoria Coach Station, Croydon Trams engineering and surface operations which could mean up to 1000 TfL workers on strike.”

Graham Daly, TfL’s head of compliance, policing and on-street operations, said:

We are disappointed that Unite has called for strike action for enforcement officers working in our Compliance, Policing and On-Street (CPOS) team, in response to pay issues. TfL made a fair and final pay offer last summer for all operational CPOS staff. The offer is consistent across other TfL teams and was the outcome of detailed discussions involving our staff and Trade Unions. Plans are in place to ensure that any impact of industrial action is minimised.