Latest news with #VictoriaLine
The Independent
16-07-2025
- Politics
- The Independent
Passengers intervene to stop Labour MP being ‘hassled' by man on Tube
Labour MP Stella Creasy thanked London Underground passengers for intervening when she was harassed by a man on the Victoria Line. Ms Creasy is considering reporting the incident to the police and has appealed for witnesses to come forward. This incident follows a history of abuse and harassment faced by Ms Creasy, including from anti-abortion activists and a man who was jailed in 2014 for sending her violent messages. She was previously forced to install a panic button at her home due to threats received after supporting Jane Austen's image on a banknote. The incident highlights concerns raised by a recent cross-party inquiry, which warned that abuse and intimidation against MPs are undermining democracy, and called for a review of electoral law and enhanced security for political candidates. Stella Creasy thanks passengers for intervening as she was 'hassled' by man on London Underground
The Independent
16-07-2025
- Politics
- The Independent
Stella Creasy thanks passengers for intervening as she was ‘hassled' by man on London Underground
A female Labour MP has thanked London Underground passengers for rushing to her defence as she was hassled by a man. Stella Creasy was on the Victoria Line when she began to be harassed by the male passenger in an incident she is planning to report to the police. In a post on X, formerly Twitter, the Walthamstow MP said: 'If you were one of the passengers on the victoria line just now who intervened to stop a man hassling me thank you from the bottom of my heart. 'Please get in touch with my office if you are prepared to be a witness as maybe the police might listen to you about him now!' The Independent contacted Ms Creasy to ask for more details. TFL was contacted for comment. Ms Creasy has been repeatedly targeted with abuse, lashing out last year at the crusade of harassment launched against her by anti-abortion activists, an issue on which she has campaigned. In a moving interview with The Independent, Ms Creasy said she was facing 'a bonfire of abuse' from anti-abortion ideologues on social media in punishment for campaigning on abortion rights. And in 2013, a man was arrested after launching a torrent of violent abuse on social media at Ms Creasy. Peter Nunn, a blogger from Bristol, was sentenced to 18 weeks imprisonment in September 2014 for sending messages to Ms Creasy calling her a witch and retweeting rape threats. She and other feminist campaigners were harassed after expressing support for the image of author Jane Austen to be placed on a banknote. After the incident, Ms Creasy was forced to have a panic button installed in her home. Ms Creasy's latest incident comes months after a cross-party inquiry warned that democracy is being undermined by the scale of abuse, threats and intimidation facing MPs. A survey by the Speaker's Conference revealed about half of MPs said threatening behaviour had caused anxiety or depression (49 per cent), with a similar share feeling unsafe as a result (52 per cent). The inquiry concluded that electoral law is 'not fit for purpose' in relation to tackling abuse of political candidates in elections and called for a Government review to assess security and electoral integrity. This phase of the Conference was established in 2024 to help ensure that elections to Parliament are conducted freely and fairly, without threats or violence. It also seeks to enable candidates to campaign safely and support elected representatives to do their job securely. Commenting on the findings, Sir Lindsay Hoyle, Commons Speaker and chairman of the Speaker's Conference, said: 'Participating in free and fair democratic processes – as a candidate or a Member of Parliament – is a privilege, and we expect that to come with robust political discourse and debate. 'But abuse, threats and intimidation should never be part of this job. It threatens the health of our democracy, and forces people to choose between the public good and their own safety and wellbeing. 'I am grateful to members, their staff and the witnesses we have heard from to date for sharing their experiences with us and look forward to working with colleagues on the next phase of the Conference's work.'
Telegraph
15-07-2025
- Telegraph
My £1,000-a-month commute is so hellish I'm forced to move to London
My mother often says that 'hell is not a place, it's other people'. But I have in fact come to discover that it is a place. That place, or rather journey, is the West Midlands Railway service to Milton Keynes Central. Every week, I spend hours on their trains. I'm often hit by delays or cancellations, and am nearly always late home, questioning my sanity as I sprint alongside hundreds of others to fight for a space. It should take an hour to get to work – taxi to the station, train to Euston, then four stops on the Victoria line. But one day last week, I spent a record seven hours of my life commuting. That's a full work day, and I had to pay for the privilege of being there. Now, after three years of spending nearly £1,000 a month on a journey that truly brings out the worst in humanity, I'm moving to London and saying goodbye to my savings. My monthly travel outgoings consist of taxis to and from the station, costing between £10 and £15. My peak-time return train journey costs £18.60, even with a 16-25 railcard. Then add another £5.80 a day for a sweltering ride on the Victoria line. In all, I spend an average of £247 a week, or £988 a month. It's no longer financially beneficial for me to continue living at home. A monthly ticket from Hemel Hempstead to Euston is £470.80 (railcard discounts don't apply), meaning it's actually more expensive than what I'm paying now. Even my 17-year-old brother spends £100 on train fares just to get to college... one stop away. In March, fares rose 4.6pc. At the same time, thousands of trains journeys go nowhere every year. On average, 3.4pc of UK trains are cancelled – rising to 4.3pc on West Midlands routes, lucky me! On top of cancellations, there are delays. Only 64pc of West Midlands trains run on time, and last year more than 200,000 trains were cancelled. Delays cause overcrowding. I'm often left without a seat, or forced to wait for the next train. Then, of course, there are the strikes which leave me stranded. This has left me facing the London dilemma. Do I pay more to rent in London and save my sanity? I stayed home while studying for a master's degree, planning to move out after, but couldn't afford to on the £22,000 salary I earned at my first job. I'm in a different position now, but moving will still significantly dent my bank balance. Unsurprisingly, I am not alone. More than half of all 20- to 24-year-olds still live at home. Moving to London is, financially, barely palatable. According to Spareroom, the listings site, the average price for rent in London is £980 per month. This excludes ever-rising council tax, groceries – and of course, the cost of a pint. But I think I might go mad if I spend too much time waiting for my train to never arrive. I just have to decide which financial stress suits me more. My number one priority when I move into the city is to cut down my commute. Thankfully, my housemates-to-be are keen to live fairly centrally. But £1,000 a month really does not go very far. I'll likely end up in an ex-council flat, with no outdoor space, dishwasher or nearby Tube station. I have friends who were forced to move out of their flat when water started pouring through their light fixtures and it was deemed potentially life-threatening to continue living there. Their landlord painted over the damage. Now, they're taking legal action to get their deposit back. While this may all sound like a first-world problem, I think it speaks to a wider issue of Britain's failing essential services. If I'm feeling forced to move into London, I can assume I'm not the only one. This is only going to contribute to the housing crisis in the capital and push rent prices up as rooms become even more competitive. Without living at home, I couldn't have afforded my master's degree or accepted a £22,000 salary to start my career. But most young people don't have that option. Now, I can barely afford to live rent-free because I'm being fleeced daily. Ultimately, I have been left with no choice. I'll be moving into London in two months. I'm not sure how I'll save for a house or have a life, but at least I won't be running for the train.
Metro
13-07-2025
- Business
- Metro
Andy Burnham wants to take Manchester underground
Andy Burnham pricked up ears this week when he unveiled ambitious plans for an underground railway in Manchester. The Mayor of Greater Manchester said the city's transport network would have to go underground by 2050 if it is to keep up with the demand. Outlining his ten-year strategy earlier this week, Burnham promised Britain's third largest city its 'best decade since the Victorian era'. Burnham announced the eye-catching proposals, centred around a flagship underground hub at Piccadilly railway station. Citing the limits of expanding the city's existing Metrolink tram network on the surface, Burnham announced he had instructed Transport for Greater Manchester (TfGM) to 'start planning' for an underground network. Manchester previously experimented with the concept of a 'Tube' like railway between its two major stations, Piccadilly and Victoria. The plan, dubbed the 'Picc-Vic', was considered in the 1970s. Trains would have run every two to three minutes in twin tunnels between the hubs, and ten minutes to areas outside of the city centre. But it was abandoned after the Westminster government decided the costs were prohibitive, having been estimated at more than £9million (or £139million in today's money). In his speech, Burnham said the Bee Network, which comprises of Manchester's Metrolink tram network as well as buses which have been brought under local authority control was fast reaching its capacity. He said: 'We are building the Bee Network on the surface. If we achieve our economic ambitions, we will be struggling to manage. 'I am going to ask Transport for Greater Manchester (TfGM) to look at options for underground services. We will work with the government to look at financing it.' The new subterranean concept would be centred around a new interchange at Piccadilly Station, he said. It would complement the existing tram system, which runs on a mix of dedicated lines and streets shared with road traffic. As well as relieving congestion on the local and suburban rail network, it would offer better connectivity within the city centre. A total of 42 million passenger journeys are made on the tram network alone – up from 25 million in 2012. The idea of an underground station at the city's main rail terminus was previously considered as part of the now cancelled leg of HS2 and in plans for a new railway between Liverpool and Manchester. In 1971, Manchester's then transport authority presented plans to go underground, with promotional artwork depicting Victoria Line style tube trains which would run on a 2.75 mile between Piccadilly and Victoria. The Picc-Vicc railway formed part of a four-phase 25-year plan for Manchester's transport system. The same decade, partially underground mass transit systems were established in both Liverpool and Newcastle. But the Manchester scheme never took off after a failure to secure central government funding for the project, which would have cost £139million in today's money. Instead, the city revived its tram network, closed in 1949. The Metrolink has expanded to 99 stops across 64 miles of track. In 2012, remains of the tunnel scheme were discovered by two lecturers at the University of Manchester. Dr Martin Dodge and Richard Brook found what would have been the beginnings of a station dug 30ft below the Arndale shopping centre. One major obstacle to the project, like its 1970s predecessor, would be its inevitably huge cost, with underground railways notoriously expensive to develop and construct. London's Elizabeth Line was delivered at a final cost of £18.8billion, significantly up from the £14.8billion originally budgeted for the scheme. The cost of Burnham's ambitious 'tube' plans would certainly be measured in the billions, possibly as much as £10billion for what would almost certainly be a far shorter railway than Crossrail, an expert has said. David Leeder, from consultancy Transport Investment Limited, said the mayor would struggle to deliver the scheme from local taxes and would instead rely on a grant from Westminster. More Trending He told Metro: 'Yes, the rail infrastructure in Manchester is undoubtedly crowded, but how will a multi billion pound scheme actually be funded when we are on the precipice of a public spending and borrowing crisis? 'The city mayors are set up in such a way that their default answer is always 'by a grant from the DfT / HM Treasury, to be paid for by taxes that mainly fall on London and the south east'.' He added that the scheme, given its complexity, could eat up 'hundreds of millions' in just the development stage, and would likely require operating subsidies in the region of 'tens of millions per annum'. 'The passenger volumes in Manchester are a fraction of those in London. Yes it was very hard to make an economic case for the Elizabeth Line, even with such huge volumes, so it will be harder still in Manchester', he said. Get in touch with our news team by emailing us at webnews@ For more stories like this, check our news page. MORE: M60 closed for hours after serious crash on motorway MORE: I got a massive tattoo of this UK city to prove my love MORE: BST Hyde Park issues update on headliner's health after sudden gig cancellation
Telegraph
20-06-2025
- Climate
- Telegraph
Are London commuters treated worse than cattle in hot weather? I took the Tube to find out
Whether you're commuting to work or simply travelling around London, on even a relatively mild summer's day it's practically a guarantee that you'll arrive at your destination drenched in sweat. The hottest temperature ever recorded on London's Tube is a matter of some debate. During the 2006 heatwave, unsubstantiated reports of 47C made headlines. During the 2022 heatwave, Transport for London (TfL) advised customers to only travel if absolutely necessary, and reporters recorded temperatures over 40C on the Tube. According to TfL's own stats, the highest temperature recorded in 2024 was a comparatively cool 31.1C on the Victoria line in August. Yet, for context, regulations prohibit the moving of farm animals if temperatures exceed 30C. Truly, today's commuters are treated worse than cattle. But just how bad can it get? With the mercury already at 26C outside, and armed with a Tommee Tippee baby room thermometer, I jumped on the Tube just after the morning rush hour in central London to find out. Which is the hottest Tube line? Starting at Tottenham Court Road at 9.30am, I hopped straight on the Central line to Oxford Circus. It is infamous amongst Londoners for being the stickiest of all the Underground's lines, and according to TfL's data in 2024 it was in fact only the second hottest (behind the Victoria line), with stations reaching a peak of 30.6C. On the train, my thermometer beat this comfortably. Central line: 31.7C From Oxford Circus, I raced up to Warren Street on the TfL's 'official' hottest route: the Victoria line. It's worth emphasising that TfL only records temperatures at stations, rather than the trains themselves, with highs of 31.1C recorded. My on-train reading was much warmer. Victoria line: 33.6C The Northern line is considered one of the Underground's 'Deep' lines (Hampstead lies 58.5m below ground level) so consequently ventilation isn't always great. My journey avoided plumbing those depths while spiriting me from Warren Street back to Tottenham Court Road, but it was still hot, hot, hot. Northern line: 32.4C From the baking to the merely simmering, the journey from Tottenham Court Road to Bond Street via London's newest stretch of underground railway, the Elizabeth line, really shows the difference that air conditioning can make. Elizabeth line: 25.8C By the time I boarded the Jubilee line from Bond Street to Westminster I was starting to get used to the heat. Jubilee line trains are some of the smallest physically so there is very little room for ventilation or air conditioning units to be installed. Jubilee line: 31.3C The modern 'walk-through' District and Circle lines, like the Elizabeth line, are blessed with air conditioning. However, as they are only partially overground, they suffer from 'solar gain' where the trains and tracks heat up due to the sun when it's hot outside. On my journey from Westminster to Embankment, I could still feel the heat. District line: 30.4C Bakerloo line trains date back to 1972 and are therefore the oldest rolling stock still in active service on any railway line in Britain. I feared temperatures would be excessive, especially when I saw the swathe of newspapers placed over the ventilation within my carriage, but it turned out the Bakerloo was relatively cool. Bakerloo line: 30.9C With new air-conditioned trains coming into service on the Piccadilly line from the end of 2025, it should rapidly cool down in the coming years. Just as well, as my journey from Piccadilly Circus to Green Park saw me recording the hottest temperatures on my Tube odyssey. Piccadilly line: 34.2C The average temperature of my morning's travel was 31.3C, which, given that I was travelling before midday, is alarmingly hot. It's certainly warm enough for TfL to activate its hot weather plan: warnings that passengers should carry a bottle of water at all times could be heard frequently on my journey. Why does the Tube get so hot? A report by Rail Engineering in 2007 found that the vast majority of the heat is caused by the friction of the trains braking on the tracks. During the 2022 heatwave, trains were ordered to run more slowly to mitigate the release of braking heat. Once the underground gets hot, it stays hot. The clay into which the underground tunnels were dug acts as a heat sink, absorbing around 80 per cent of the heat generated. Scientists have estimated that when the tunnels were first dug, that clay would have been about 14C, and it is now 19-26C. Ventilation systems on the older and deeper lines such as the Piccadilly and Bakerloo were not designed to cope with the levels of heat produced by modern trains, so only around 10 per cent of heat is vented out of the network. The size of the tunnels on the London Underground are the second smallest of any underground railways in the world (only the Glasgow Subway has smaller tunnels) making it difficult and expensive to fit extra ventilation and air conditioning systems into them. What is TfL doing to cool down the Tube? There are a variety of schemes underway to help reduce temperatures underground, from air cooling units to massive chillers at some stations. Groundwater beneath Victoria station has been used for cooling; Green Park features an underground aquifer which helps cool it. Ventilation capacity and new fans are also being installed. Some Tube trains – including the Circle, District, Hammersmith & City, Metropolitan and Elizabeth line – now feature air-conditioning within their carriages. The Piccadilly line will join this list when its new trains enter service from the end of 2025. The Bakerloo, Waterloo and City, and Central lines will be next in line, though no firm timeline has been announced. A TfL spokesperson told The Telegraph that despite 2019 reports of new air-conditioned trains being unveiled by 2030, funding was never secured and it was unlikely the trains would be air conditioned within the next 20 years, with Bakerloo line trains being given priority before then. Despite the Victoria line being the hottest on the underground last year (with temperatures averaging 30C between June and October) there are no plans to upgrade trains on the Victoria, Northern or Jubilee lines. How to stay safe when travelling in hot weather Always carry water to avoid dehydration. During hot weather, you can lose 1.5 to 2 litres of water an hour through sweat. 'If you don't replace these fluids, your blood thickens and your heart has to work harder to maintain your blood pressure and oxygen levels,' warns Dileep Lobo, a professor of gastrointestinal surgery at University of Nottingham, who researches fluid and electrolyte balance. According to nutritional therapist Madeleine Shaw, it could also be worth adding an electrolyte sachet to your water before you travel: 'This is a great way to start the day and really important on hot sweaty days,' she says. TfL regularly advices passengers to get off the train if they feel dizzy or unwell, as it is easier for paramedics to reach people on platforms than on the trains themselves. Carl Eddleston, TfL's Director of Streets & Network Operations, said: 'With continuous hot weather forecast over the coming days, we are encouraging customers to carry water with them when they travel. 'We have a comprehensive hot weather plan in place to protect the network's infrastructure with resources on standby to help respond to the impact and to keep services running. 'Please look out for each other while travelling. For the latest information on how TfL services are operating, customers should use TfL's real-time travel tools, including status updates, Journey Planner and TfL Go.'
