London faces a significantly disrupted Easter weekend for public transport users, with Euston station closing entirely from Good Friday through to Wednesday April 8, alongside a series of tube and rail line closures across the network.
The timing, coinciding with what the RAC is predicting will be the busiest Easter on UK roads since 2022, creates an unusually complicated travel picture for anyone moving around or out of the capital over the four-day bank holiday.
The closure of Euston is the headline disruption. All Avanti West Coast and London Northwestern Railway services south of Milton Keynes Central will be replaced by buses during the closure, meaning that travellers heading to and from Scotland, the north-west of England and the west Midlands will need to factor in significant extra journey time or find alternative routes into the capital via other stations. The works at Euston are described as “major improvement works,” a description that offers little comfort to anyone who had planned to pass through.
The closure also affects Lioness line trains on Saturday and Sunday, while the Bakerloo line will not run between Queens Park and Watford Junction on the same days. On the Southern network, a reduced service between Waterloo and Clapham Junction is in place from Good Friday through Easter Monday as part of ongoing upgrades.
The A40, meanwhile, has been closed in both directions between the Westway roundabout and Marylebone Flyover since March 20 and the closure extends through late April, with Transport for London warning of “severe delays” during peak periods.
Transport for London’s broader tube network is also affected, with closures across multiple lines scheduled between Good Friday and Easter Monday. Passengers are being advised to check their specific routes well in advance, as the combination of engineering works across different parts of the network means that even journeys that don’t directly involve the major closures may be affected by knock-on congestion and reduced frequency.
The engineering logic behind scheduling this kind of major work over a bank holiday is straightforward. Passenger numbers are substantially lower than on a typical weekday, giving engineers access to infrastructure that would be impossible to close during normal operations without causing unacceptable disruption. The irony is that the people who do need to travel over Easter tend to be making longer, more planned journeys, often with luggage and family members, making alternative arrangements harder to accommodate.
For those travelling by car, the A40 closure and the anticipated volume of Easter traffic means that anyone driving in or out of west and central London should expect delays that may rival the disruption on public transport. The RAC’s prediction of a particularly busy Easter on the roads reflects broader public awareness of the public transport challenges, with some drivers likely choosing to drive routes they would normally take by rail or tube.