Wimbledon bosses to give Khan’s TfL a dressing down after Tube chaos

 Wimbledon bosses are poised to give Sir Sadiq Khan’s Transport for London (TfL) a dressing down after the tennis championships were hit by Tube chaos.

On Monday, TfL announced that there was no service between Parsons Green and Wimbledon on the District line, forcing tennis fans to find an alternative route.

The operator said a signal failure between Edgware Road and Parsons Green had also caused severe delays.

Paul Kohler, the Liberal Democrat MP for Wimbledon, had branded delays last week an “international embarrassment” and called on Sir Sadiq, the Mayor of London, to “get a grip”.

Sally Bolton, the chief executive of the All England Lawn Tennis Club, said the club would be meeting TfL bosses at the end of the championships to assess the service provided.

“We’re working with them all year,” she said. “We have been, and remain, clear with them that delivering an event of this scale in this part of London requires the infrastructure in this part of London to support us in doing that.

“They’re very aware of that view, and we have arranged to catch up with them after the championships to look at not just what happened this year but also to look ahead in terms of investment into the District line.”

‘Challenging’ week of delays

TfL apologised on Monday for disruption after a “challenging” week.

Meanwhile, Mr Kohler posted on social media: “Things do not seem to be improving on the District line and, despite ⁦TfL telling reporters they were going to meet with me last Friday, no such meeting was arranged.”

The MP added that he was “pressing” TfL for a date for the meeting as he called for action to be taken.

Mr Kohler said the Mayor of London was personally responsible for the District line failings and their resolution.

“This is the jewel in the crown of British sport. And we can’t get the infrastructure working to get people there and back.”

He said the local community and area was being “incapacitated” by the District line.

“There is continued concern about Sir Sadiq’s role in supervising TfL,” he added. “It beggars belief that some parts of the line are more than 100 years old.

“He needs to put more money into the infrastructure.”

He called on any expansion of the championships to include a compromise of improved services on the line.

Susan Hall, the leader of the Conservatives in City Hall, said Sir Sadiq had shown a “lack of leadership”, adding: “It is simply not good enough that this poor level of service is continuing. What message about London does it send to tourists here to watch the tennis that not even the trains work?

“Instead of putting fares up and not running a good enough service, he must step up immediately. He has shown a total lack of leadership on this. Thousands of people wait all year to go somewhere world famous like Wimbledon, and the mayor is making their lives very difficult.”

Major delays to the second week of the Wimbledon fortnight came after TfL had already issued a public apology on Thursday. It had claimed delays had been caused by Network Rail signalling problems.

But the Tube has struggled to cope, with problems including signal failures and a fire alert at Southfields, the station closest to the All England Club.

Commenting on services provided, Network Rail previously said it had been able to “deliver around 75 per cent of the planned service with no reported passenger issues”.

A TfL spokesman said: “We apologise to customers affected by the disruption on the District line [on Monday], which is due to a track fault at Putney Bridge.

“Our engineers are working hard to rectify the fault as soon as possible and restore a good service. We acknowledge that today’s disruption comes on the back of a challenging week for District line services last week.”

A spokesman for the Mayor of London said: “The Mayor is extremely frustrated by the recent disruption on the District line, which falls well below the standard Londoners and visitors to the capital expect and deserve.

“City Hall is writing to Network Rail today, urging them to work constructively with TfL to resolve this disruption as soon as possible and work to ensure we don’t see repeated signal failures in future.”

Network Rail said the issue was related to TfL.