On Sun, 24 Jan 2010 21:37:30 +0000, Paul Corfield
wrote:

I believe Milton Keynes still has a form of Smartcard scheme

Nope, not any more. Abandoning it was one of the early-ish things
Arriva did on taking over MK Metro a couple of years ago. It used to
take longer to process than a cash fare, was unreliable, still printed
a ticket, still required stating of a destination and never used the
stored value functionality other than for child tickets. Its
replacement, traditional ticket-in-a-laminated-wallet weeklies and
monthlies are quicker to process, easier for other operators to
accept[1] and can be issued for the first time on the bus, which the
old cards couldn't (you had to go to the depot).

[1] MK Metro tickets are the "de facto" interavailable ticket in MK,
other than on a few non-MK Metro commercial or non-MK Council tendered
services.

Neil

--
Neil Williams
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