In uk.transport.london wrote:
I wonder if TfL will eventually get rid of the magnetic strip tickets in
favour of disposable SmartCards for single journeys or infrequent trips?

Cost of a basic smartcard is somewhere in the region of $1-$5. That's not
going to be cost effective unless it becomes feasible to make them out of
organic or polycrystalline semiconductors (cheap, but the density and
performance is nowhere near yet). Then they could be printed on paper
again, or plastic.

Theo

Theo Markettos wrote:
Cost of a basic smartcard is somewhere in the region of $1-$5. That's not
going to be cost effective unless it becomes feasible to make them out of
organic or polycrystalline semiconductors (cheap, but the density and
performance is nowhere near yet). Then they could be printed on paper
again, or plastic.

In Portugal (Porto and Lisbon), they use stiff paper smartcards for
ticketing, and the cost of the card is a few tens of Euro cents in
addition to the cost of the travel (I can't remember the exact cost, but
it was considerably less than $1).

The cards are two layers of stiff paper or thin card and the aerial is
made of foil in between the two layers. There is a small (about 1 mm
square) chip that you can see as a small lump in the card. (A few years
ago I disassembled a Lisbon one to see how it was constructed).

--
Jeremy Double {real address, include nospam}
Rail and transport photos at
http://www.flickr.com/photos/jmdoubl...7603834894248/

......
I was going to contact Barclaycard to ask whether I could have a card
without PayPass, but after recalling previous experiences dealing with their
customer services I decided against it...

Net result: Barclaycard have lost my business to AmEx, and I get the bonus
of a credit card company that don't treat their customers with contempt.
.....

I did contact Barclaycard, and they promised me that was no problem; a
week later I received a new card...with paypass still on it. A few
phonecalls later and I too had left Barclaycard - awful CS.

stan5001 wrote:

Barclaycard - awful CS.

Couldn't agree more. Another "Lets outsource it to India and provide the
workers with a first line script that doesn't actually work for
customers" operation.

CJB wrote:
Recently I obtained a Hillingdon Community Services card which doubles
as a Library user's card. And put it into the same card wallet as my
Oyster card - in which I also keep my bank card. Suddently my Oyster
card stopped working on trains and buses, and even the Heathrow
Connect portable validators wouldn't recognise it - to considerable
embarrasment. The culprit was the Hillingdon Community Services card -
which seems to use the same technology as Oyster and was causing a
confict. An irritation 'cos now I have to keep them in separated. CJB.

Having been the holder of a cambridge uni card for a while (never used
oyster but had a few freinds who had both) they could get to lectures
fine with both cards being read, but when they tried to get the tube is
complained about unactive oyster card or somthing,

anyway the answer is to put one card on one side of your wallet, the
other on the other side, and a credit card shaped peice of tinfoil
behind each, touch one side of the wallet for oyster, the other side for
door entry

On Jan 31, 9:50*pm, Jeremy Double wrote:
Theo Markettos wrote:
Cost of a basic smartcard is somewhere in the region of $1-$5. *That's not
going to be cost effective unless it becomes feasible to make them out of
organic or polycrystalline semiconductors (cheap, but the density and
performance is nowhere near yet). *Then they could be printed on paper
again, or plastic.

In Portugal (Porto and Lisbon), they use stiff paper smartcards for
ticketing, and the cost of the card is a few tens of Euro cents in
addition to the cost of the travel (I can't remember the exact cost, but
it was considerably less than $1).

The cards are two layers of stiff paper or thin card and the aerial is
made of foil in between the two layers. There is a small (about 1 mm
square) chip that you can see as a small lump in the card. (A few years
ago I disassembled a Lisbon one to see how it was constructed).

--
Jeremy Double {real address, include nospam}
Rail and transport photos athttp://www.flickr.com/photos/jmdouble/collections/72157603834894248/

The contrast here is between a stiff plastic card with high quality
printing and a protective overlay (life 10 years) and the laminated
paper and foil construction, simpler printing, less physically secure
and life about a year (longer life, more cost, if protective overlays
are used). But also the low cost product tends to use a cheaper chip
with lower security. There is a new generation of low cost chips with
AES encryption (current mainstream USA designed symmetric crypto), but
UK/EU infrastructure in general doesn't support it yet - building
access terminals will be the first to do that, maybe by the end of
this year for the first commercial system offerings.

ticketyboo wrote:
On Jan 31, 9:50 pm, Jeremy Double wrote:
Theo Markettos wrote:
Cost of a basic smartcard is somewhere in the region of $1-$5. That's not
going to be cost effective unless it becomes feasible to make them out of
organic or polycrystalline semiconductors (cheap, but the density and
performance is nowhere near yet). Then they could be printed on paper
again, or plastic.
In Portugal (Porto and Lisbon), they use stiff paper smartcards for
ticketing, and the cost of the card is a few tens of Euro cents in
addition to the cost of the travel (I can't remember the exact cost, but
it was considerably less than $1).

The cards are two layers of stiff paper or thin card and the aerial is
made of foil in between the two layers. There is a small (about 1 mm
square) chip that you can see as a small lump in the card. (A few years
ago I disassembled a Lisbon one to see how it was constructed).

--
Jeremy Double {real address, include nospam}
Rail and transport photos athttp://www.flickr.com/photos/jmdouble/collections/72157603834894248/

The contrast here is between a stiff plastic card with high quality
printing and a protective overlay (life 10 years) and the laminated
paper and foil construction, simpler printing, less physically secure
and life about a year (longer life, more cost, if protective overlays
are used).

But if you want to use smartcards for all tickets (as appeared to be the
case when I was in Porto in the Autumn), the low cost option is more
acceptable to visitors...

I wouldn't worry about having to pay 50 cents for a paper smartcard on
which to load tickets for a trip of a day or two, but once the cost gets
much above one Euro, and the smartcard is plastic and suitable for 10
years continuous use, I start to think I'm being ripped off.
--
Jeremy Double {real address, include nospam}
Rail and transport photos at
http://www.flickr.com/photos/jmdoubl...7603834894248/

On Jan 30, 10:21*am, "
wrote:
I wonder if TfL will eventually get rid of the magnetic strip tickets in
favour of disposable SmartCards for single journeys or infrequent trips?

That or re-usable tokens (about the size of a gbp2 coin) like used in
Singapore?

Neil

On Feb 1, 9:14*am, Jeremy Double wrote:

I wouldn't worry about having to pay 50 cents for a paper smartcard on
which to load tickets for a trip of a day or two, but once the cost gets
much above one Euro, and the smartcard is plastic and suitable for 10
years continuous use, I start to think I'm being ripped off.

Or you re-jig your ticket machines such that they can refund
deposits? I'm not convinced there is an issue then.

Neil

On Fri, Jan 29, 2010 at 08:31:36PM +0000, Matthew Geier wrote:

And the Singapore card has a better antenna - I discovered that the LU
gates were still getting upset - I had removed my oyster from my wallet
and was placing it on the reader to open the gates - but as I walked
through the gates beeped. It dawned on me later, the Oyster pad must have
been getting a response from the Singapore CEPAS card as I walked through
the gate - at range of over 20cm between my hip pocket and the Oyster
reader pad.

And yet people still think contactless payment systems are a good idea.

Proprietary stored value cards that only work in closed systems like
Oyster aren't so bad, but I wouldn't feel particularly happy at
accidentally paying for the purchases of the person in front of me in
the queue at the petrol station.

--
David Cantrell | London Perl Mongers Deputy Chief Heretic

Fashion label: n: a liferaft for personalities
which lack intrinsic buoyancy