Londoners struggle to work amid tube strike

People wait for busses at Waterloo station in London. A tube strike today has closed the TfL London Underground network as members of four unions take industrial action for the second time in a month because of a deadlocked dispute over plans to launch a new all-night tube train service next month. Extra busses have been laid on to help commuters get to work. [Photo/IC]

Transport for London (TfL) said it was laying on an extra 250 buses to help commuters get about the city. But massive queues developed at bus stops and taxi ranks, and many commuters said their journeys had taken far longer than usual.

The action follows a long dispute over the plans for some 24-hour services at weekends on the "Tube", as the world's oldest underground passenger railway is known. The services are due to begin on Sept. 12.

Nick Brown, the managing director of London Underground, said it had offered unions an above-inflation 2 percent pay rise, a one-off payment of 500 pounds and a promise that drivers would have the same number of weekends off. Annual leave would remain the same - 43 days for a train driver and 52 days for station staff.