A Wellington train conductor has been left in tears following a chaotic morning of delays.
A passenger told 1News the woman was receiving abuse after operator Metlink was forced to drop track speed limits, leaving timetables in tatters.
Metlink were forced to make the changes this morning after KiwiRail delayed safety assessments on part of its network
Speaking to Breakfast, KiwiRail's Paul Ashton apologised to capital commuters for this week's disruption.
"This is clearly and solely KiwiRail's responsibility, we have a track evaluation car that needed some urgent repairs which were undertaken on Friday and Saturday in Auckland, we moved the machine to Palmerston North yesterday and the evaluations on the Kapiti line will commence tonight.
"Then we will run through the rest of the lines and have it all completed by the end of the week on Friday if not earlier."
Several other passengers told 1News they are infuriated with the disruptions, with passengers crammed inside the trains "like sardines" this morning.
One woman said: "It was absolutely packed, standing room only and squished right in."
Another passenger said: "It's pretty useless when you know it's one piece of equipment in the country that's failed, as my husband described it it's like a warrant of fitness that they've obviously run right down timing wise, so [I'm] unimpressed, it's going to be a hard week."
Greater Wellington Regional Council have also criticised KiwiRail, describing the situation as a "monumental failure".
The council's chair Daran Ponter told Breakfast he takes his hat off to KiwiRail for apologising but it still doesn't fix the problem.
He said there are "systemic cultural" problems within KiwiRail that need to be addressed and questioned whether this issue is just "the tip of the iceberg".
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