Phil Richards wrote:

Mizter T wrote:
The Rail Minister Tom Harris has announced that the National Rail (NR)
network in London is to adopt a zonal fares system. This will apply to
all rail journeys that are wholly within the London Travelcard zones
(that is zones 1 - 6).

This change, which will come into effect from January 2007, has been in
the pipeline for a long time. It paves the way for Oyster Pay-as-you-go
(PAYG) to be implemented across the whole National Rail network in
London (currently Oyster PAYG is only accepted on a limited number of
NR routes).

There will be single, return and cheap day return (CDR) tickets
available. Many have suggested that a zonal ticketing system will do
away with CDRs and will be pleased to hear they are to stay.

A full table of the fares is included in the DfT press release.

Will zonal rail tickets show origin/destination stations like they do at
present and therefore a return be A to B & back to A only? Or could I
buy a Zone 1 to 5 Rail only CDR say to go from Victoria to East Croydon
and later in the day Bromley South back to Victoria?


A good, and as yet unanswered question. I reckon that tickets will
continue to be issued from and to specific named stations, because as
much of the suburban network is ungated there'd be more of an
opportunity for fraudulent re-use of tickets if they were issued merely
with their zonal validity printed on them.

This is of course to the inconvenience of passenger flexibility.
However when Oyster PAYG is eventually rolled out across the whole NR
network in London then that will provide that flexibilty - e.g. for the
Victoria - East Croydon then Bromley South - Victoria journey you speak
of.