Angry residents are demanding an explanation after it took engineers almost seven hours to fix the barriers at one of Mole Valley's busiest level crossings.

Network Rail has been slammed by Ashtead's homeowners and councillors for bringing traffic to a standstill last Thursday as its engineers battled to fix a "defective switch" at the level crossing adjacent to the village's train station.

The barriers failed just after 7pm and were not fully functional again until 2am.

A limited amount of traffic movement was allowed while workmen hurried to fix the problem, but the bottle-neck prevented many residents from getting to their home behind the station, as the level crossing provides the only vehicular access.

Some residents abandoned their cars and had to use a nearby foot crossing.

Eyewitness Valerie Bull, of Woodfield Lane, said: "The queue of cars was built up all the way up to Barnett Wood Lane. I felt so sorry for the people who live on the other side of the station."

Len Wood, of Ashtead Woods Road, was waiting in a queue on the other side of the station, along Woodfield Road, and turned his car around. He said: "It's the price we pay for living in a quiet location. However, I don't think it would have been too hard to have had someone moving the traffic.

"Quite a lot of people on this side gave up as well and turned around and I know people were waiting for a long time in Overdale."

David Baker, from the Ashtead Residents' Association, agreed with Mr Wood that Network Rail should have done more to keep the traffic flowing.

He said: "We have written to Network Rail to find out what took them so long and why manual operation was not put into place straight away. In this modern age it should have been easy to organise a stop and go sign."

Independent district councillor John Northcott, whose Ashtead Common ward covers the station, said it was a "bad closure" and there seemed "no reason for it".

Tory county councillor Tim Ashton said the closure was "disgraceful" and he now wants an emergency access only level crossing put at the bottom of Woodfield.

Network Rail confirmed its engineers had been trying to fix a defective switch until 2am. They also said police officers were on hand to direct the traffic.

A spokeswoman for Surrey Police confirmed officers were on the scene from 9pm until around midnight.