HUNDREDS of commuters faced a travel nightmare this morning after one of
the country’s biggest train stations was hit with a power failure.
Services from Birmingham New Street station ground to a halt after signals
failed at a nearby Junction.
Problems were expected to continue until midday as engineers scrambled to
restore services.
It meant chaos for the Monday morning commuters with Arriva Trains Wales,
CrossCountry Trains, London Midland and Virgin trains all affected.
Chris Denham, from Network Rail, said: “We’ve had a problem with the
power supply that lights all the signals up just south of Birmingham New
Street which has been ongoing for several hours now.”
Birmingham New Street is the busiest railway station outside of London,
handling more than 35million passengers each year.
Some took to Twitter in anger vent their frustration at the delays.
Thomas O’Keeffe wrote: “So, this is what we pay extortionate travel costs
for? Delayed, delayed, cancelled, delayed, cancelled…”
Christopher Chiswell joked: “Technically, #BirminghamNewSt must still be
under warranty. Maybe we can take it back & swap it for one that works?”
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Network Rail confirmed that power had been restored to the Proof House
Junction at 10am and that it was working to return services to their normal
schedule.
It is the second time in a week that Midlanders have faced delays to their
railway services.
Birmingham International station was brought to standstill when overhead
electric wires stopped working last Tuesday.