No, clearly not, but if you can climb down a ladder you can climb up one. (As a climber, I'm well versed in the fact that downclimbing (to retreat from a route that is too hard, for example) is far harder than climbing up!)
So all we need to do is ensure all train passengers are experienced climbers then....
The point in all of this is that there is no hard & fast method to deal with incidents, no neat little list or PowerPoint presentation to follow step by step. Every incident has to be dealt with on it's own merits, every eventuality considered and risk assessed. Most if not all people criticising how this was handled actually do not know what decision making processes took place, and why each decision was made. They have just read a local rag's third hand, Twitter based account and set off on some faux rage rampage. I am sure that evacuation was considered from the outset, but given that the unit was in the throat of a very busy station, where a total shut down would have stranded dozens of trains & thousands of additional passengers, and that there was no imminent danger to the passengers on the unit the decision was made to try all other options first. To me this seems sensible and risked no more than some inconvenience to those passengers on-board. Had a more serious issue developed, those on site and in control would have responded accordingly.
If folk aren't happy with that, all I can suggest is to get your applications into Network Rail for positions that would put you in the decision making loop. Because speaking as someone who was stuck on a train for far longer than this incident, I feel comfortable leaving the decision making to those professionals in charge, and not the RUK home-made experts.
As somebody who spent 3 months in a hospital bed and suffered significant muscle wastage I must respectfully disagree. I was perfectly capable of stepping down, but if the step was too high I didn't have sufficient strength to step up. would have Going up this ladder would have been impossible for me.
My wife is starting to suffer from arthritis, and she is starting to find it harder to climb up than climb down. And she would certainly struggle with those little ladders.