Angel station in Islington, which serves almost 12 million passengers a year, may be shut by Transport for London (TfL) while it replaces the station's escalators, according to The Standard.
The 35-year-old staircases are the longest on the Underground. In April, one of the Northern Line station's three 200 ft escalators failed. It is understood that TfL believes the second could also fail imminently, while the third is also in desperate need of upgrading.
TfL is considering making the station exit-only during off-peak periods from November while some repairs are completed. But it would mean travellers would not be able to take trains from there in the evenings or at weekends.
All three escalators will need to be replaced, and this work could take about a year. TfL said the escalators are too long to safely operate as a fixed staircase, and that there is no safe means of moving customers between the ticket hall and mid-concourse levels should they be out of service.
A TfL spokesperson told The Standard one possible option is a 12-month full closure in order to work on both faulty escalators at the same time, while another is keeping the station partially open and working on one escalator at a time.
Escalator failures are among the most visible of TfL's vast £6.5 billion maintenance backlog, with many escalators across the network in need of repair.