On Feb 28, 10:05*pm, Mizter T wrote:

On Feb 28, 9:31*pm, Roland Perry wrote:

In message , at 19:52:01 on Mon,
28 Feb 2011, Mizter T remarked:

As Roland said, don't sell it as family-friendly.

Please tell me where there has been any suggestion that it was going to
be sold as "family friendly" - seriously, where? There's no mention or
implication of any such thing in the TfL press release.

The scheme is already being described in such glowing terms as:

* * * * "[great for] millions of visitors who will flock to the Capital
* * * * to enjoy the greatest show on earth"

It's extremely likely that the publicity for that kind of thing will show
happy families grinning at each other - it's a modern cliche for almost
all leisure travel.

http://www.ofenhandwerk.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/familytravel.jpg

Why wait for evidence eh?

And yes, I'm aware I did some heavy speculating w.r.t. the future of
the OnePulse card - I did however try and flag it up as speculation,
and it was based on the fact that at this present moment it's not
available to new customers.

Meanwhile, I can't think of any publicity promoting Oyster which
features/featured happy families grinning at each other.

By all means feel free to continue throwing punches at apparitions
though.

On Feb 28, 10:01*pm, "Paul Scott"
wrote:

"Clive Page" wrote:

If visitors could just swipe a regular credit card it would save them a
lot of trouble, and still be cheaper than paying a large number of single
fares at inflated cash rates. *Such customers might be willing to forgive
the other limitations, e.g. no capping or loading of railcards.

If you read the whole thread, capping is presumed workable, as charging will
only be done on an 'end of the day' basis.

OTOH railcards don't seem to have been discussed at length yet...

Won't discuss it at length... ;-) ...but I guess associating a
Railcard with an EMV card on the central database would at least be
theoretically possible - I can imagine various process issues about
actually implementing such a thing though.

In message
, at
14:15:28 on Mon, 28 Feb 2011, Mizter T remarked:
Meanwhile, I can't think of any publicity promoting Oyster which
features/featured happy families grinning at each other.

That's because it isn't targeted at tourists. The paywave scheme is.
--
Roland Perry

On Feb 28, 10:20*pm, Roland Perry wrote:

In message
, at
14:15:28 on Mon, 28 Feb 2011, Mizter T remarked:

Meanwhile, I can't think of any publicity promoting Oyster which
features/featured happy families grinning at each other.

That's because it isn't targeted at tourists. The paywave scheme is.

Though by its nature this new scheme will not be aimed at families.
(Though there's the free Tube travel for accompanied children up to 10
years old inclusive - a concession that has survived recent cuts so
might be here to stay.)

FWIW, looking at ticket products targeted at tourists, there aren't
any 'happy families' on show at TfL's online "Visitor Tickets" shop...
http://visitorshop.tfl.gov.uk/

....well, there are these images of families but their in outline only
so can't really be described as 'happy families' type pictures...
http://visitorshop.tfl.gov.uk/englis...h-children.htm

....and there's nothing that fits that description on the relevant
section of the Visit Britain website either (which sells Visitor
Oyster cards)...
http://www.visitbritain.com/en/Trans...-Transport.htm

(I can't quite believe you've invoked me to be so petty!)

Lastly I realise that the press release makes heavy mention of
visitors, but if this new scheme is to offer an Oyster PAYG-alike
product replete with capping (and given it'll work on a 'post-pay'
principle, I don't see why it shouldn't), then I can't see why it
won't be an attractive option to Londoners - adult Londoners I should
add! (Whether Travelcards and Railcards could be associated with 'pay
and wave' cards is another question - but even if they're not, there's
plenty of public transport using adults without Railcards who don't
travel often enough to justify a season Travelcard or Bus Pass, and
furthermore there's the prospect of some sort of weekly capping
arrangement on the not too distant horizon.)

On Mon, 28 Feb 2011 10:57:32 -0000, "Mizter T"
wrote:

All 'child' Oyster cards - 5-10, 11-15 and 16+ (for 16-18 year olds)
flavours - are issued to specific individuals, [...]
Applying for one of these card costs GBP10 (some applications used to be
free, I can't remember which ones right now).

You might consider that a business model weakness, but just dispensing
non-individualised child Oyster cards to all and sundry would also be a
business model weakness.

Exactly. Probably not as bad as giving anyone up to about 25 a free
ride on the bus but they fixed that eventually.

TfL do flag up the existence of the child off-peak Day Travelcard (now GBP
3.00), and suggest that for a few days usage this might be a better option.

So TfL have provided a very cheap ticket with no bureaucracy, and a
higher-priced option (reflecting the costs of issuing it) that allows
anyone prepared to queue for it - and that can be quite a hassle - a
way to get the same offer as a local. I'm not sure what more people
expect TfL to do. Ask RATP what they charge children over 10 years
old - and while you're at it ask why a weekly ticket has to start on a
Monday!

Richard.

In article ,
(Mizter T) wrote:

wrote:

In article ,
(Mizter T) wrote:

wrote:

In article ,
(Mizter T) wrote:

A question for you Colin - do you think the fact that this
upcoming 'pay and wave' facility isn't going to accommodate for
an adult travelling with 11-15 year old children, without those
children holding separate tickets, inherently mean the whole idea
is invalid - regardless of the number of other people who would
benefit from it?

I think that the present system strongly tends to rip off visitors
from outside London (and completely casual users from inside London
but I doubt there are many of them). It's all part of the general
problem in public transport that it is often hard work to use the
systems if you are not a regular customer.

I thought Paywave was supposed to level things up a bit but it
continues the horrendous treatment of non-London children over the
age of 10 who get charged full fares and have a lot more hassle
getting any tickets unless they get day Travelcards from their
stations of origin outside London (so no use for overnight stays).

Eh? But children *can* buy Day Travelcards *within* London - the
off-peak version (zones 1-6) currently costs GBP 3.00.

They can if they queues at ticket offices, yes.

Well, that's something - your earlier "horrendous treatment"
comment (quoted above) didn't appear to acknowledge that was even a
possibility.

I used the term "horrendous treatment" because of the way out of London
children are treated so badly compared to children who live in london. We
were all the same when i was a London child.

(Also, FWIW, they can be purchased from NR ticket machines.)

A fat lot of use at King's Cross without a significant detour or other
underground stations.

The 11-15 Oyster photocard is available to children aged 11-15 who
live outside London. Yes, you need to apply in advance; yes you
need to pay GBP 10 for it, yes, it's not spontaneous; yes, the
child needs to remember to bring it - but it's available and it's
not a secret: http://www.tfl.gov.uk/tickets/14310.aspx

You'll need to use it a lot to justify spending £10 on it! Hardly
available for casual visitors, even those who plan ahead.

Not sure what the "hardly" qualifier is meant to mean - these
Oyster photocards are available to all young people, casual
visitors or not. Whether getting one would be worthwhile or not
depends on the individual circumstances (e.g. for some the free bus
travel could make it pay for itself).

Now, now. Let's not get all tetchy about words! I think we can agree that
£10 is not for casual visitors from e.g. Nottingham.

How do you propose that a 'pay and wave' fare payment system would
work for multiple people travelling together with one card?
(Without just allowing accompanying children aged 11-15 to travel
for free, which isn't going to happen.)

As Roland said, don't sell it as family-friendly.

Please tell me where there has been any suggestion that it was
going to be sold as "family friendly" - seriously, where? There's
no mention or implication of any such thing in the TfL press
release.

It's rather easy to argue against a position that you have set up
yourself.

Roland has answered this.

It's the same for me if I stay overnight, or would be if I didn't
use my bike as I will tomorrow/Wednesday. All the ticketing
integration that Capitalcards brought in is being slowly eroded.

Eh? What's the same for you? (Really - I don't get what you're
saying.)

There are few NR+TfL non-day return tickets, mostly not competitively
priced and only allowing end-to-end returns and not multiple tube
trips as day Travelcards do. Using my bike minimises my need to use
public transport within London and so bypasses the problem.

Think about it. What tickets are there for a trip that departs
Cambridge one morning, then King's Cross-Westminster,
Westminster-Putney, then Putney-Westminster, Westminster-King's Cross
and return to Cambridge the next day? Compare with the products
available for similar trips taking place on one day only.

You use Oyster PAYG, or buy a Day Travelcard - so what's the
problem? (Any child could buy a Day Travelcard, or even suffer the
unspeakable horrors of obtaining an Oyster photocard.)

Again only if they join the endless queues. One of the points of out of
London Travelcards was to avoid the need to queue to buy another ticket in
london. That is what is must being eroded.

UIVMM there's never been an outboundary multiple-day Travelcard
(i.e. period return bundled with a multiple-day Travelcard) - or
was there ever an outboundary Weekend Travelcard?

No. It's an old grouse of mine, since I started working in London in 2001.

I disagree with the notion that ticketing integration is being
eroded - what is an annoyance is that the situation on National
Rail is subtly different (e.g. no free travel for accompanied
children aged 5-10), but that's not TfL's fault.

If the premium above the day return fare for a day travelcard rises to
the level FCC and NXEA have taken it, above the cost of two off peak
tube journeys, it is often not clear which is the better ticket to
buy. The difference is now £7.00 for those without railcards. A Zones
1 & 2 off-peak travelcard is now £6.60. So anyone travelling from
Cambridge and not travelling outside zones 1 & 2 should buy a day
return and then a TfL travelcard when they get to London. Getting a
day travelcard always used to be a no-brainer. That's what I call
erosion!

OK, understood - that is of course the profiteering TOCs doing (as
opposed to TfL's). Ultimately this is the look out of DfT Rail -
they're the ones in charge of rail fares policy - alas it sounds as
though things are moving in the direction of them being more
hands-off rather than more hands-on in regards to such matters
(though the continuuing IEP project is I guess a counter-example).

Each of the TOCs and TfL point the finger at the other for this. Another
casualty of the fragmentation of the railways.

Note that many other TOCs, including the also First-owned Great
Western, have lower travelcard premia so it is still a no-brainer to
get one, e.g. from Oxford where the premium is £3.50 on the same £21
day return fare to London Terminals and £5 (FCC & super off-peak only)
from Brighton (CDR £15).

Checking some more locations I see the premium from Winchester is
£9.80. With a zones 1-6 day travelcard at £8, what is the point of
selling an out-of London day travelcard at that price other than to
rip people off to avoid a queue at Waterloo? This is especially odd
given that the premium from Basingstoke (also SWT) is only £4.80 (via
Woking).

Another example is Canterbury where the premium is £3.30 (or £3.50 via
HS1) on the £25.40 off-peak day return.

See my comments above - I agree, these are examples of rip-offs. In
the context of their continuing existence, my only advice to
punters would be either to use Oyster PAYG or else purchase their
Travelcards from NR ticket machines on the concourse on arrival at
say Waterloo which will inevitably be less busy the LU ticket
machines and windows - of course doing that means the offending TOC
gets the commission for selling the ticket though.

I can fully appreciate your annoyance at this - and I see that it
means for a child making a day trip to London from say Cambridge,
getting an outboundary Travelcard is no longer the 'no brainer' it
once was - but I fail to see the connect between this issue and
your apparent hostility to this new 'pay and wave' scheme (which is
just going to be another way for adults to pay for their travels).

I was hoping paywave would remove problems for families but now it just
complicates things, exactly the sort of thing to put people not in the
know like us from train travel. More of them will just jump in their cars.
:-(

--
Colin Rosenstiel

In article
,
(Mizter T) wrote:

On Feb 28, 10:01*pm, "Paul Scott"
wrote:

"Clive Page" wrote:

If visitors could just swipe a regular credit card it would save
them a lot of trouble, and still be cheaper than paying a large
number of single fares at inflated cash rates. *Such customers might
be willing to forgive the other limitations, e.g. no capping or
loading of railcards.

If you read the whole thread, capping is presumed workable, as
charging will only be done on an 'end of the day' basis.

OTOH railcards don't seem to have been discussed at length yet...

Won't discuss it at length... ;-) ...but I guess associating a
Railcard with an EMV card on the central database would at least be
theoretically possible - I can imagine various process issues about
actually implementing such a thing though.

Given the arcane way it is done with Oyster now, who knows?

--
Colin Rosenstiel

In article ,
(Mizter T) wrote:

You didn't have free travel on buses (& trams) up to the age of 15
inclusive (and 16 - 18 if a London resident in full time
education), you didn't have free Tube/DLR/LO travel (and a few NR
routes) if accompanied by an adult, and you didn't enjoy an
off-peak PAYG price cap (zones 1-9) of £1.30.

Too right! It cost me 4d to get home by trolleybus and bus from school in
Hammersmith to Putney, or 3 1/2d if I walked across Putney Bridge. GOK
what the tram fares were. They went when I was a toddler. :-)

It might be a bit more complicated than in days of yore, but it's a
*damn sight cheaper* to travel around London as a child or young
person these days than it was for years and years beforehand
(thanks to these Livingstonian era innovations, and indeed thanks
to Boris for maintaining them) - and I wholeheartedly approve of
that.

The difference is the treatment of out of London children who get few of
these perks. Cost me full fares for the occasional visits by my children
who didn't know if they would make 2 or 3 zone 1 tube journeys.

(Though, FWIW, at least some of these GBP 10 charges for child
Oyster photocard applications came in recently under Boris, where
they used to be free.)

I knew we had to blame Boris for something mean. And we can't even vote
him out!

--
Colin Rosenstiel

In article ,
(Mizter T) wrote:

She'll need a ticket if travelling on most of NR routes in London
(including basically all of them south of the river) - but that's
because the TOCs aren't kindly enough to offer free travel to
accompanied children under 11. A 11-15 Oyster photocard would be
one way of dealing with this - if travelling off-peak then the
applicable cap is GBP 1.30.

Including Putney! Grrr! I suppose it rather depends on how long her
great-grandmother lasts. My mother is 92. To get home from Putney on
Sunday I had to use SWT because the District Wimbledon branch appeared to
be suspended. Putney was crawling with rail replacement buses, some in
very eccentric liveries. Fortunately I had an NXEA Super Off-Peak Day
Travelcard (see my other post about that confusing the SWT barriers).

Off-peak Day Travelcards for children cost GBP 3.00 - or GBP 2.00
if they are travelling with an adult who has a F&F Railcard,
Network Railcard (weekends only), Gold Card or HM Forces Railcard -
needs to be purchased from a ticket office (though I'm guessing NR
ticket machines may offer them if the adult is buying a ticket for
themself too [2]). See the bottom of this page:
http://www.tfl.gov.uk/tickets/14554.aspx

But not for Senior Railcard holders! The *******s!

--
Colin Rosenstiel

In article , (Roland
Perry) wrote:

In message , at
09:27:12 on Mon, 28 Feb 2011, remarked:

Travelcards .... I presume you can't get them from Nottingham at all?

I think the furthest out you can get one is Kettering, or maybe
Wellingborough.

On the Midland Main Line I'm sure you're right but elsewhere? Exeter?

--
Colin Rosenstiel