Request ID: FOI-1244-2324 Date published: 04 August 2023
You asked
I WOULD LIKE TO REQUEST THE FOLLOWING INFORMATION UNDER FOI LEGISLATION.
1. I would like to request details
of the number of accidents and incidents where “untied” shoelaces were a factor in the each of the last 5 years at tube stations and on the network?
2. What advice, and from whom was it sought, to advise passengers to ensure their shoelaces were tied, as per “safety” messages played throughout the network?
We answered
TfL Ref: FOI-1244-2324
Thank you for your request received by Transport for London (TfL) on 18th July 2023 asking for information about accidents on the London Underground. Please note that the correct reference for this case is FOI-1244-2324, and not FOI-1252-2324 as previously advised in error.
Your request has been considered in accordance with the requirements of the Freedom of Information Act / Environmental Information Regulations and our information access policy.
Specifically you asked:
“1. I would like to request details of the number of accidents and incidents where “untied” shoelaces were a factor in the each of the last 5 years at tube stations and on the network?
2. What advice, and from whom was it sought, to advise passengers to ensure their shoelaces were tied, as per “safety” messages played throughout the network?”
In answer to your first question, I am afraid that it is not possible to source this information within the costs limit for responding to FOI cases, as set out under section 12 of the Freedom of Information Act. Under section 12, TfL is not required to provide information if it would cost more than £450 to determine if that information is held, and to then locate, retrieve or extract it from elsewhere. This is calculated at a rate of £25 per hour, equivalent to 18 hours work. In this instance the exemption applies because the information has not been collated before, and there is no quick, efficient or automated way of doing so. Rather, we would have to manually review each incident report to see whether any reference was made to untied shoelaces. Given the numbers involved, this is not possible within the costs limit. As an example, in 2022 alone this would require the manual review of around 4,500 such records. This in itself would be enough to trigger the costs exemption, notwithstanding the other four years covered by your request. In order to bring your request within the costs limit you may wish to reframe it. For example, we would be able to respond in respect of “trips, slips and falls” more generally,
In answer to your second question, London Underground does not have a standard announcement played throughout the network about untied shoelaces. There may be occasions where bespoke announcements are made at stations following an incident, with such decisions taken at the local level and made by staff at the time via the station PA.
Please see the attached information sheet for details of your right to appeal as well as information on copyright and what to do if you would like to re-use any of the information we have disclosed.
Yours sincerely,
David Wells FOI Case Officer FOI Case Management Team General Counsel Transport for London
