Going down!

We returned from our Summer vacation in August to find the escalators undergoing refurbishment at Swiss Cottage tube station. The first stairway is scheduled to be back in action by mid-December, with the second to be completed by May next year! While I understand the need to refurbish aging equipment, it seems extraordinary that each escalator is out of service for almost five months.

With only one escalator operational, we’ll be walking down 55 steps each day for the next nine months to reach the platform. Fortunately our station isn’t too deep. Angel Station on the Northern Line has the network’s longest escalator. It’s 60 metres long and rises 27.5 metres. Bank Station has an incredible 15 escalators in action.

Needless to say the tube isn’t a pedestrian friendly place when the escalators are out of action. I have sympathy for families lugging strollers and travelers dragging luggage off to the airport. It will be our turn tomorrow. We’re off to Dublin for a long weekend.

At last count there were at least 413 escalators across the network, travelling the equivalent of two round the world trips every week. With all of that perpetual motion it’s probably time for our station’s escalators to be refurbished. London Underground says that the average escalator remains in service for 40 years. Given that Swiss Cottage station was opened November 20, 1939, our escalators are probably 25 years old or more.