Lines reopened: Major disruption between London and Stevenage expected until the end of the day 

Route(s) affected

Grand Central between London Kings Cross and Bradford Interchange / Sunderland

Great Northern between Moorgate and Welwyn Garden City, and between London Kings Cross and Letchworth Garden City / Cambridge / Ely / Kings Lynn

Hull Trains between London Kings Cross and Hull / Beverley

LNER between London Kings Cross and Lincoln / Leeds / Harrogate / York / Edinburgh / Glasgow Central / Aberdeen / Inverness

Lumo between London Kings Cross and Edinburgh

Thameslink between Brighton and Cambridge, and Horsham and Peterborough

Description

Following an earlier fault with the signalling system at Welwyn Garden City all lines have now reopened. Trains between London and Stevenage may continue to be cancelled, severely delayed by up to 100 minutes or diverted.

Major disruption is expected until the end of the day.

Customer advice:

Great Northern / Thameslink

Please do not travel on this route. Operators are experiencing severe disruption and can't guarantee you can get to your destination at the moment.

They are working to reintroduce some services but because of the severity of this disruption, delays, cancellations and short notice amendments are expected until end of day.

The below routes will be heavily impacted:

• Services that usually run between Brighton and Cambridge

• Services that usually run between Horsham and Peterborough

• Services that usually run between Sevenoaks and Welwyn Garden City

• Services that usually run between London Kings Cross and Cambridge

• Services that usually run between London Kings Cross and Kings Lynn

There will be an extremely reduce service between Cambridge and Kings Lynn.

If you do need to travel and its essential, you can find the alternative route guides below which will assist you:

• Great Northern alternative route guide

• Thameslink alternative route guide

Ticket acceptance

You can use your ticket on the following, at no extra cost:

• Greater Anglia services between London Liverpool Street and Hertford East, which is roughly a 20-minute walk from Hertford North

• Elizabeth line services between Farringdon and London Liverpool Street change at London Liverpool Street for Enfield Town on the London Overground route

• London Overground services between London Liverpool Street and Enfield Town, which is roughly a 10-minute walk from Enfield Chase

• London Underground via any reasonable route

Uno Buses:

• 601 – Between Radlett and Welwyn Garden City (for Hatfield and St Albans City)

• 602 – Between Radlett, St Albans and Hatfield

• 653 – Between St Albans, Hatfield, and Welwyn Garden City

• 610 – Between Potters Bar, Brookmans Park, Welham Green, Hatfield, Harpenden and Luton

The following buses that are an option that will require an additional charge:

Centrebus:

• 366 between Hatfield, Harpenden, Welwyn Garden City, Luton Airport Parkway and Luton

• 610 Between Cockforsters, Potters Bar, Brookmans Park, Welham Green, Hatfield, Harpenden and Luton (check if this is running as it only does one trip)

• 44 Between Luton Airport Parkway, Luton, Knebworth and Stevenage

Sullivan buses:

• 84 Between Potters Bar and St Albans (used to be Metroline but moved to Sullivan)

Arriva:

• 55 – Between Stevenage and Letchworth

• 100/101 – Between Luton Airport, Luton, Stevenage and Hitchin

• 301 – Between St Albans, Welwyn Garden City, Welwyn North, Knebworth and Stevenage

• 302 – Between St Albans, Hatfield and Welwyn Garden City

• 724 – Between St Albans, Hertford North, Hertford East, Hatfield and Welwyn Garden City

If you are at the station waiting to board, please check station information screens for more information on your journey.

Planning your journey:

You can check train departures from your station here:

• Great Northern live departure boards

• Thameslink live departure boards

You can view live maps of the network here:

• Great Northern live route map

• Thameslink live route map

If you're travelling in the London area, you can plan journeys on alternative routes by using the TfL Journey Planner here.

LNER

You may use your ticket at no extra cost onboard the following services:

• CrossCountry between Sheffield / Doncaster / Leeds / York and Newcastle / Edinburgh

• East Midlands Railway between London St Pancras International and Leicester / Sheffield

• Great Northern / Thameslink between London Kings Cross and Stevenage / Peterborough

• Northern between Leeds and Skipton / Harrogate

• TransPennine Express between Leeds and York / Newcastle

If you have a LNER train ticket dated for today, Thursday 18 July you will be able to use your ticket on another LNER service, tomorrow, Friday 19 July.

Customers travelling to Selby, Brough or Hull will be provided with rail replacement from Doncaster.

Can you tell me more about the incident?

Your journey is likely to be disrupted by a complete failure of the signalling system in this area. The signals on the affected part of our network will have changed so that they are only showing red lights to drivers. This means that trains are unable to travel forward on any line. We won't be able to provide you with a train service at the moment.

The scale of this issue means that it could be a challenge to give you an estimate for the delays. Operators are working closely with Network Rail, who manage the signalling system, so that we can get more details. Their staff will be investigating as quickly as possible.

Complete signalling failures can be caused by a number of different problems - for example, power issues, cable faults or significant weather events. Sometimes there can be multiple faults which contribute to the same incident. As this type of failure is so disruptive, fault-finding and repair work will be given a high priority, and we'll pass on any updates.

Check before you travel:

You can check your journey using the National Rail Enquiries real-time Journey Planner.

For helpful advice if you need to travel on a rail replacement service, including accessibility information, please use this page.

You can find the location of your replacement bus by checking station signs or by searching for your station on our station information pages.

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.