Anger at “sea of bodies” at busy Elizabeth Line station

By Joe Coughlan, Local Democracy Reporter

An Elizabeth Line station in Greenwich has been described as ‘chaotic’ during rush hour, with commuters feeling like they’re in a ‘sea of bodies’. 

Woolwich Elizabeth Line station opened in May 2022 and has become consistently more popular ever since, with a regular 35,000 entries and exits to the station on weekdays reported by Transport for London (TfL) only a year after it opened.

Data from TfL showed that the Elizabeth Line regularly has one of the highest customer satisfaction scores of all modes of transport across its network. The transport authority added that the busiest ever day of the service saw 770,000 journeys taking place on December 14 last year.

TfL began a trial for a new queuing system at the station on January 15. The trial involved adding barriers to divide the entrances and exits of the three escalators to maintain safety during rush hour.

Ravi Samani, 38, said half of the journeys he took on the Elizabeth Line this week were affected by either signal failures or faulty trains. He said he worried that adding extra queuing measures to the station would not “go down very well” among commuters.

Mr Samani said: “Out of four times I’ve used it, on two separate occasions there’s been either delays, or there has been some kind of malfunction on the track or the train. 

“You’re always late or the service levels of the tracks are not great. On top of that, if you have to add a queue to the escalator, it’s not great when everyone is always late for everything anyway.”

Simon Scott, 39, has lived in a flat next  to the station for two years and uses the service nearly daily. He said residents had previously raised concerns about there only being one entrance and exit to the busy station, and was worried about how more people moving into the area would affect the line.

Mr Scott said: “It’s got busier because occasionally, with the first train in the morning I get it, you actually might not get a seat with people coming from Abbey Wood, which was never an issue when it first opened.”

Rachel Francis, 47, said she uses the line three days a week during rush hour from the Woolwich station. She added that using the service has become less pleasant over time as more people have found out about the station.

Ms Francis said: “It’s very, very busy. You’re in a sea of bodies and it’s not very pleasant. For me, it is worse in the evening. It can be quite chaotic and dangerous. If people are in a bad mood, I guess they could get quite aggressive about it.”

A TfL spokesman said safety was the transport authority’s number one priority. They said crowd management measures were sometimes employed on the Elizabeth Line, such as one-way systems, barriers or encouraging customers with luggage to use lifts.

They added: “The Elizabeth Line has been extremely popular since opening in 2022, with about 4.5 million journeys now taking place each week. We are constantly looking to improve the customer experience and make journeys more comfortable, so we are trialling better separation of customers entering and exiting Woolwich at busy times.”

Pictured top: Simon Scott, 39, said he uses the Woolwich Elizabeth Line station nearly daily (Picture: Joe Coughlan)