Disruption between London St Pancras International and Luton expected until 10:00 

Route(s) affected

East Midlands Railway between London St Pancras International and Corby / Nottingham / Sheffield

Thameslink between Brighton / Three Bridges / Rainham (Kent) and Bedford, and between Rainham (Kent) / Gillingham (Kent) and Luton, and between Sutton (Surrey) and St Albans City

Description

A fault with the signalling system in the St Albans City area means that some lines are blocked. As a result, trains running between London St Pancras International and Luton may be delayed by up to 15 minutes, revised or cancelled.

Disruption is expected until 10:00.

East Midlands Railway customer advice:

What has happened?

There is a fault with the signalling system at St Albans City. This is between London St Pancras international and Luton and is disrupting trains on the London St Pancras International / Nottingham / Sheffield route and London St Pancras International / Luton Airport Parkway / Corby route.

How does this affect my train?

Trains running through the area may be delayed by 5-10 minutes in both directions.

How do I get where I need to be?

You should continue to travel as originally planned however your journey may be delayed by 5-10 minutes.

Thameslink customer advice:

Thameslink services are being delayed by around 10-20 minutes in the St Albans City area, and there will be some service changes at short notice.

Where trains are changed, they may not stop at all the usual stations, and others may not complete their full journeys.

There may also be a small number of cancellations.

There have also been some further delays to northbound trains through the Central London area, due to a power supply fault between City Thameslink and London St Pancras International.

Please check journey planning tools before you go to the station. If there is a long wait until the next train, you may wish to consider using a different local public transport route, even though this could also take longer than usual.

Your ticket will be valid at no extra cost on:

• London Northwestern Railway services between:

  • Bedford and Bletchley

  • St Albans Abbey and Watford Junction

  • Bletchley, Watford Junction and London Euston

• East Midlands Railway services between Bedford, Luton, Luton Airport Parkway and London St Pancras International

• London Buses between the Elstree area and stations on affected routes across London

• London Underground services on any reasonable route

• London Trams between Wimbledon, Mitcham Junction, West Croydon and East Croydon

• Southern services via Sutton and via East Croydon

• South Western Railway services between Wimbledon and London Waterloo

• Southeastern services between Herne Hill and London Victoria

• Alternative Thameslink services, if available, on any reasonable route

Routes affected:

Trains are most significantly affected on the route between St Albans City and Sutton (via either Wimbledon or Mitcham Junction).

There may also be some delays and potential alterations on the following routes:

• Bedford - Three Bridges (via Redhill)

• Bedford - Brighton

• Luton - Rainham

Planning your journey:

You can use the live departure boards, and you can also view a live map of the network.

You can also see their alternative route guide.

If you're travelling in the London area, you can plan journeys on alternative routes by using the TfL Journey Planner. You can also use our app to find up-to-date information.

Can you tell me more about the incident:

Network Rail are working to deal with damage to an item of technical equipment within the signalling system at St Albans City. This device is called an "interrupter", and detects whether trains have reached the correct position in the siding, which is a short stretch of track where empty trains briefly wait after terminating at St Albans City.

Because this device is reported to have been damaged by an arriving train, the siding cannot be used correctly.

Some trains are therefore using alternative lines to travel through St Albans City, and also to start and finish their journeys there.

This leads to congestion, and as a result, some service changes.

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.