Urine, vomit, and faeces on Metro trains – 150 disgusting incidents recorded on system

New figures have revealed the number of disgusting incidents on Tyne and Wear’s rail network since 2016.

Metro operator Nexus confirmed that, between January 2016 and May this year, vomit had to be cleaned off their carriages 148 times.

There were nine reports of faeces and a further eight of urine on the trains.

There was a significant reduction in the frequency of the revolting acts in 2018, but numbers for the first five months of this year suggest they are on the rise again.

There were 51 incidents in 2016 and 54 in 2017 before a notable drop to just 36 in 2018, according to figures obtained via a Freedom of Information request.

However, Nexus had already recorded 24 by the end of May 2019 after vomiting incidents hit their highest level for two years in March.

Nexus say that any carriage found in an unfit state is removed from service and that the entire fleet is given a deep clean once a week.

It was reported in February that a Metro train had to be withdrawn after faeces was found on three seats.

A Nexus spokesman said: “Our staff and cleaners check Metro trains hour by hour – at each terminating point, and now with extra cleaners deployed as trains pass through the city centres.

“In a single month Metro sees more than 8,000 individual on-train cleans by an army of dedicated staff. When an incident does occur a cleaner is immediately called in by our control room.

“Over the last three years Metro has carried more than 120 million passengers on 550,000 individual train services, so the number of hygiene incidents is very low for what is one of the busiest mass transport system outside of London.

“Any carriage that is found in an unfit state is removed from service. Seats are completely replaced where needed. All of the trains in our fleet get a full deep clean at the depot every seven days.

“Metro carries 36 million passengers a year and our customer satisfaction surveys show that customers are satisfied with overall cleanliness.”

New figures reveal that there were 3,896 recorded police incidents on the Tyne and Wear rail network in 2018/19, up from just 2,561 the previous year.

However, Nexus bosses say the rise is down to increased Metro staff and police patrols reporting incidents and that the actual crime rate on the network fell by 10%.