On Tue, 21 Sep 2004 23:20:10 +0100, Tom Anderson
wrote:
If there was an off-peak season travelcard with a
reasonable saving, i'd definitely go for that, because i get the same
security at a lower cost, and i wouldn't be clogging up the system.

Merseytravel offer such a thing at a very heavily discounted price, as
do many of the German Verkehrsverbuende (normally sold as CC-Karten,
though I have no idea what those initials stand for).

I must say that the fare structure still strikes me as confusing, and
not at all well-suited for implementation onto smart-card ticketing.
IMO, London still needs to look to the rest of Europe, especially
Germany, for its example. Fewer fare levels (OK, the flattening of
the zones is a start) and through-ticketing/unified pricing by all
modes is IMO the way forward.

Neil

--
Neil Williams in Milton Keynes, UK
To e-mail use neil at the above domain

"Tom Anderson" wrote in message
...

Interesting. People seem to be assuming that
making travel free for kids will make kids travel
more - that there's elasticity in the market.

I certainly would have used them more if they were free when I was a child.
In fact, I still would. But that's me.

In cold or rainy weather, buses will make far superior places for teenagers
to hang about than outside.

--
John Rowland - Spamtrapped
Transport Plans for the London Area, updated 2001
http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Acro...69/tpftla.html
A man's vehicle is a symbol of his manhood.
That's why my vehicle's the Piccadilly Line -
It's the size of a county and it comes every two and a half minutes

"Richard J." wrote in message
...

But the whole point of the fare structure is to
encourage people not to use cash fares.

The cost of a daily bus pass has gone from GBP2 to GBP3 in a short period of
time (2 years?), and I don't see how that can be explained in terms of
wanting to discourage cash fares.

Incidentally, this is the first time ever that the bus fare structure is so
complex that I don't fully understand it! But I can see I'll have to abandon
Saver Tickets, with which I am very happy, for Pre Pay. So I'll have to
grasp the nettle of some new technology, even though my current public
transport usage is one midday return bus journey once a week

--
John Rowland - Spamtrapped
Transport Plans for the London Area, updated 2001
http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Acro...69/tpftla.html
A man's vehicle is a symbol of his manhood.
That's why my vehicle's the Piccadilly Line -
It's the size of a county and it comes every two and a half minutes

Sorry, I got the years wrong. It should have been:
2002 - 80p - 50% rise
2003 - 70p - 70% rise


Mind you I remember in 1999 the bus fare (outside Zone 1) was 90p....
then it went down to 70p, so really in 5 years it's gone up 30p

"Paul Corfield" wrote in message
...

The prepay etc. fares are just a smoke screen. It's like a firm saying -
"look, we haven't put our prices up this year but, for those of you not
paying by direct debit you'll now pay another £2/month!"

Well yes but the objective is to get the remaining 15% of passengers out
of cash and into some form of pre-payment.


So why the ****ting hell is it still not possible to put one day bus
passes/travelcards on Oyster?

These are surely the most popular, and very often best value tickets for the
occasional or semi-frequent traveller, but the entire Pre Pay system
excludes them - outside of this notion of 'capping' which was promised
months ago, but which I fear will ne'er be introduced.

BTN

"Tom Anderson" wrote in message
...

In particular, i suspect Ken believes that spend on bus travel as a
fraction of income is highest amongst the poorest people in London (which
seems plausible - the absolute expense is probably constant, so the poorer
you are, the greater the relative expense; also, better-off people are
more likely to use other modes), and thus that this is essentially a
progressive tax break; redistribution by the back door. Not that there's
anything wrong with that, of course!


I consider there to be quite a lot wrong with the constant redistribution of
my money to people that I despise, and who probably aren't too keen on me
either, despite my constant subsidising them, the ****ing ungrateful
hypocrites. Something that every elected administration at every level has
seen fit to do, one way or another.

BTN

--- "Sir Benjamin Nunn" wrote:


So why the ****ting hell is it still not possible to put one day bus
passes/travelcards on Oyster?

These are surely the most popular, and very often best value tickets for
the
occasional or semi-frequent traveller, but the entire Pre Pay system
excludes them - outside of this notion of 'capping' which was promised
months ago, but which I fear will ne'er be introduced.


Yes. Oyster is currently useless for me. Even if capping is introduced, it
still won't do me much good.

I don't live anywhere near a tube station, so I'd have to pay for a paper NR
return to central London, and then use Oyster on the tube or bus section of
the journey through Z1. Or buy a Travelcard season on Oyster, knowing that
I'll only get full use out of it for one or two days each week!

It'd probably still be cheaper to buy a paper One Day Travelcard, just as I
do now.

On Wed, 22 Sep 2004 12:11:21 +0100, "Sir Benjamin Nunn"
wrote:


"Paul Corfield" wrote in message
.. .

The prepay etc. fares are just a smoke screen. It's like a firm saying -
"look, we haven't put our prices up this year but, for those of you not
paying by direct debit you'll now pay another £2/month!"

Well yes but the objective is to get the remaining 15% of passengers out
of cash and into some form of pre-payment.


So why the ****ting hell is it still not possible to put one day bus
passes/travelcards on Oyster?

I have no idea - why don't you ask TfL why they aren't doing what you
demand?

--
Paul C


Admits to working for London Underground!

John Rowland wrote:

"Tom Anderson" wrote in message
Interesting. People seem to be assuming that
making travel free for kids will make kids travel
more - that there's elasticity in the market.

I certainly would have used them more if they were free when I was a child.
In fact, I still would. But that's me.

And me. Though at 3p a throw I was able to make as many journeys as I
had time for without spending all my pocket money. Then the incentive
was RTs. Now it would be RMs, if only for a few months.

Colin McKenzie


--
The great advantage of not trusting statistics is that
it leaves you free to believe the damned lies instead!

Tom Anderson wrote:

On Tue, 21 Sep 2004, Dan Gravell wrote:

John Rowland wrote:

Free bus travel for all under 16? That is a diabolically bad idea...
buses will become unsafe for anyone else, that's if there's room for
anyone else. If they only gave free travel to under-16s who have been
in no trouble with the police or school, that might be an idea.

There are two advantages to me:

1) Stops them going to school/piano lessons or whatever in mummy's car

Surely the kind of mum who drives her kids to school isn't going to send
them on the bus purely because it now costs a quid a day less? They'd have
to mix with all those common people!

2) Encourages ownership of public transport for kids, making for better
treatment of vehicles and a higher likelihood they will use public
transport when they are older.

Interesting. People seem to be assuming that making travel free for kids
will make kids travel more - that there's elasticity in the market. I'd
have thought that demand is already saturated; people _need_ to use the
bus to get around, so they do. Making it free will just make it cheaper
for them.

Unfortunately you're wrong. Adelaide introduced free travel for kids in
1990, but abolished it the following year because things hadn't gone
according to plan. With free buses, kids started using the bus for short
journeys where they'd otherwise have walked.