London Underground: New Central line timetable as TfL vows to fix issues

By Thomas MackintoshBBC News

The Central line is 49 miles (79km) long, making it the longest on the Tube network and accordingt to TfL data it is also the second busiest carrying about 280 million passengers a year

Transport for London (TfL) bosses have introduced an emergency timetable on the Central line to mitigate problems with its fleet of trains.

Passengers have suffered delays and cancellations since the start of November due to the 30-year-old trains repeatedly being taken out of service.

Issues are due to “abnormally high number of motor failure”, TfL said.

In a report, Commissioner Andy Lord insisted TfL was “focused on resolving the challenges on the Central line”.

Earlier this month, transport bosses warned disruption will probably last “until the summer” – as passengers vented their frustration.

The Central Line needs 77 trains to operate a full service with a train every couple of minutes – but at the moment it is operating 50 or so.

During the rush hour, TfL aims to run a timetable of 30 trains per hour, but a spokesman said it has not been able to do so for some time.

It is understood the new timetable will see 21 trains per hour during the evening peak times and avoid cancellations and “large gaps” in the service.

Commenting on the new timetable, the TfL spokesman apologised for the ongoing problems and said engineers were “working round the clock” to fix the issues.

“We have now introduced a new timetable on the Central line to make journeys more even and to create more certainty for customers while we continue to carry out urgent work to fix motors on the ageing train fleet,” she said.

“We apologise for the ongoing situation and our engineers are working around the clock to address the issues as soon as possible.”

Trains on the Central line are gradually being overhauled as part of the £500m Central Line Improvement Programme.

But, ahead of a TfL board meeting on 6 March, Mr Lord explained there were also “additional issues” with a piece of equipment which monitors the track.

As a result, Mr Lord said a number of temporary speed restrictions remained in place.

“This means that on some targeted sections of the line customers will currently experience periods where their train does not travel as quickly as usual,” Mr Lord said – although he did not detail which sections of the Central line this would be.

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