This is from the BBC about heavy rains Metro stations were flooded
Several stations were forced to close.
I thought "to be forced to do something" can be used for people. It makes sense because there is use of some coersion, a force or a strong condition. For instance "She was forced to leave."
But in this sentence, it seems that "The stations were forced to close" which sounded to me a rare usage, because I would have said "The stations had to be closed." I would have never thought to use "to be forced to do something" in place of "have to."
But then I thought maybe "to be forced to do something" might have same meaning as "have to do something". For instance "The dirty house had to be cleaned before we moved in." might have the same meaning as "The dirty house was forced to be cleaned before we moved in."
Does that also sound idiomatic if we used it that way?