Disruption between Moorgate and Finsbury Park expected until 18:00  

Route(s) affected

Trains between Moorgate and Finsbury Park / Alexandra Palace / Gordon Hill / Welwyn Garden City / Stevenage

Description

A fault with the signalling system between Moorgate and Finsbury Park means all lines are disrupted. As a result, trains will be cancelled, delayed by up to 20 minutes or diverted.

Disruption is expected until 18:00.

Customer advice:

No trains are able to run between Moorgate and Finsbury Park until further notice.

This means there will be no service between;

• Moorgate

• Old Street

• Essex Road

• Highbury & Islington

• Drayton Park

and for travel to or from these stations, you will need to use an alternative route which could extend your journey time by around 30 minutes.

Ticket acceptance

To allow you to complete your journey, your ticket will be accepted on the below services at no additional cost;

• Thameslink services via any reasonable route

• Great Northern services via any reasonable route

• London Buses between Moorgate, Finsbury Park and Kings Cross

• London Underground via any reasonable route

Can you tell me more about the incident?

Trains are likely to have some delays due to a fault with a signal in this area. In this case, the signal is unable to show the normal coloured light indications to drivers, and instead, it's showing a red light. This means drivers have to stop at the signal and gain verbal instructions to continue. Your journey will unfortunately take longer as a result.

Railway signals are designed to warn drivers that they have to stop because the system can't yet confirm that the route ahead is clear. In most places, the signalling system will show a green light, or aspect, when the track is clear for a long distance ahead, and drivers will then be shown one or two yellow lights to warn them when they are approaching a red signal. This means that they can anticipate the amount of braking that's required to stop before they reach another train or any form of problem on the line.

Signalling runs on "fail safe" principles, so if the signals can't step through the usual colours, they will instead show a more restrictive colour - for example, red instead of green. This means drivers will have to stop, but in fact, the route ahead may still be clear. This leads to delays.

The signalling system is maintained by Network Rail, and we're working closely with them to diagnose the fault and make sure it is fixed as quickly as possible. Until this is done, we'll be closely monitoring the train service and doing our best to keep to the timetable.

Check before you travel:

You can check your journey using the National Rail Enquiries real-time Journey Planner.

Compensation:

You may be entitled to compensation if you experience a delay in completing your journey today. Please keep your train ticket and make a note of your journey, as both will be required to support any claim.