Wimbledon’s MP has condemned travel chaos that left tennis fans facing cancellations, severe delays and overcrowding as an “international embarrassment”.
Paul Kohler, the local Liberal Democrat MP, said fans from across the world had struggled to get to SW19 this week because of repeated problems on London Underground’s District line.
Spectators suffered delays due to signalling failures and a track fire at Southfields – the closest station to the All England Club – as temperatures reached record highs on Monday and Tuesday.
Kohler criticised Sadiq Khan, the mayor of London and chair of Transport for London (TfL), saying the issues were an embarrassment to the capital and Wimbledon, which welcomed almost 130,000 spectators over the first three days of the championships.
“This is an international embarrassment,” Kohler said. “This is one of the jewels in the crown of British sport and people can’t even get to the championships on time because the train won’t get them there.
“There is such a contrast in how the All England Club run such a tight ship – the championships run like clockwork – and yet getting there is so difficult.
“I have huge sympathy for fans coming from around the world, and it is such a huge embarrassment that something we’re so proud of is causing so many difficulties.”
He added: “Sadiq Khan needs to just get a grip. This has been a long-running problem. No one is surprised because this happens time and time again.
“He needs to sort it out because it is an embarrassment to London and to Wimbledon – the eyes of the world are on SW19 right now.”
Tennis fans complained of “sweaty armpits” on crowded trains on Thursday as the District line was beset by severe delays and part suspended for a second day due to a track fault at Tower Hill.
Helen and Alex Kaufmann were late for the first match on Court 2 after it took them more than an hour to travel from West Hampstead to Southfields. “The [Southfields] platform was super busy, really crowded, really hard to get off. We probably waited as long to get off as we did on the train,” Helen said.
TfL issued an apology on Thursday, saying it delivered about 75% of the planned service on Monday and Tuesday.
In a joint statement with Network Rail, a spokesperson said: “We’re sorry to any District line passengers whose journeys have been affected by recent signalling issues on infrastructure shared between Network Rail and London Underground.
“Over the past two days, we’ve experienced two separate track circuit failures, which are critical to the signalling system as they tell signallers where trains are on the network. A failure causes signals to default to red for safety, which reduces the number of trains we can run through the affected area.
“In addition, a small fire on the track at Southfields on Tuesday led to a brief suspension of services … We are doing everything we can to minimise disruption, particularly during the Wimbledon championships, and we’d like to thank passengers for their patience and understanding.”
Wimbledon bosses declined to comment. But a source said 8,000 more fans a day were expected to visit during the tournament when expansion plans are passed, and that “transport infrastructure was key”. They plan to expand a park-and-ride system.
Simon Wright, 68, who opposes the plans, said this week’s overcrowding outside Southfields was the worst he had ever seen.
“Wimbledon are telling people to not arrive by car and TfL are saying they cannot run any more trains. They cannot manage the number of people they have got at the moment. I think it’s crazy. It’s the worst that I have seen, especially because the District line has been falling over,” he said.
A spokesperson for Khan said: “When there are delays on the network, TfL works at pace to restore the services to normal and minimise disruption to those travelling around our city. The mayor remains focused on delivering the reliable, world-class public transport system Londoners expect and deserve.”
