In message ,
Colin Rosenstiel writes
This year a one day travelcard from Cambridge with a Network Card costs
£1.65 more than the day return fare to London Terminals. There is no
ticket, Oyster or not, that I can buy in London that gets near that.
If you can beat Oyster fares then why are you whinging?
--
Clive

In message , Clive
writes

If you can beat Oyster fares then why are you whinging?

I think Colin's point, with which I agree, is that there are a number of
types of journey that are more expensive using Oyster.

However, whenever anyone mentions this, we seem to be dubbed "the
anti-Oyster brigade" by people whose knowledge of travel patterns other
than their own seems somewhat limited.

Personally, I am not "anti Oyster" at all - and I don't suppose Colin
is. I just wish the damn thing could actually manage to be as useful as
a daily travel card. Unfortunately it remains useless for occasional
travel on London's suburban rail network.

--
Paul Terry

asdf said:


The situation is very simple. Either

(a) They live outside the zones, and never buy Tube-only singles. They
are not affected by the fare increases. No problem

(b) They live outside the zones, yet occasionally buy Tube-only
singles. Then they can get a pre-pay Oyster instead for a £3 deposit,
which pays for itself after 2 journeys.


The REAL problem with Oyster is that it's almost totally useless for a
lot of people living IN the zones.

I live in south London, and can't use Oyster for my season ticket to
Croydon, because it's not valid on trains. There's no point using it on
the tubes, because I'll have to get a train into London before I can get
to the tube, so a paper one-day travelcard will be cheaper. So, I have
this otherwise useless card lying in my purse just so I can get a
slightly cheaper bus fare on the once or twice a month when I find that
I need to go by bus!

Except that this saving in money is paid for by an annying waste of
time, since I have to queue up in the newsagents to pay for my ticket,
instead of paying on the bus. Yes, I know I could in theory pay for my
tickets on-line, but to do that I would have to :
(a) know in advance that I will need to make a bus journey (which is
silly because if you know ion advance that you're going on a journey,
you can make other plans and so you won't need to take the bus), and
(b) be the sort of person who actually buys things on-line in the first
place instead of in a real shop where you can actually see the face of
the person you're buying from and maybe even talk to them.

If they just reduced the real bus fare down to Oyster levels, I could
get rid of the card, my purse would be slightly less cluttered, and
theyre'd be no need to keep queuing. (And if TfL do get rid of Oyster,
they wouldn't be spending money on making all those cards and readers
and gadgets and things, so they'd save money and the fares could come
down anyway.)

But, no. After all, TfL is run by men. And men love gadgets and
gizmos. The more pointless a gadget is, the more men love it. Oyster
is a particularly useless gizmo, so it's no wonder that we're stuck with
it.

I live in south London, and can't use Oyster for my season ticket to
Croydon, because it's not valid on trains.

You are misinformed. Any season ticket sold on Oyster Card can be
used on the NR trains for all the zones it is valid.

In article ,
(James Farrar) wrote:

On Mon, 31 Oct 2005 10:26 +0000 (GMT Standard Time),
(Colin Rosenstiel) wrote:

In article ,
(Clive) wrote:

In message
, Colin
Rosenstiel writes
To those who don't get it, yes.
Rubbish, we can all get it, I live 350 miles from London and I
benefit from Oyster and the cap. If you can afford cash fares
then you're too highly paid.

You do because you can't buy National rail tickets which include
tube travel. People living nearer can and therefore cover nearly all
their tube travel requirements without Oyster.

This year a one day travelcard from Cambridge with a Network Card
costs £1.65 more than the day return fare to London Terminals. There
is no ticket, Oyster or not, that I can buy in London that gets near
that.

So why are you worrying about tube singles?

Because on occasion, e.g. twice (on the same visit) this year I couldn't
use Travelcards because they only work with day return tickets from
Cambridge and I needed to make journeys beyond what is permitted on a
Saver Return to Underground Zones 1 and 2. Yesterday and today I am
making such journeys within what is permitted and don't need to buy any
singles.

As it happens I travelled to

--
Colin Rosenstiel

On Mon, 31 Oct 2005 15:02:56 -0000, "TKD" wrote:

I live in south London, and can't use Oyster for my season ticket to
Croydon, because it's not valid on trains.

You are misinformed. Any season ticket sold on Oyster Card can be
used on the NR trains for all the zones it is valid.

Perhaps a slight clarification is needed he Croydon to London
Terminals season tickets are not available on Oyster. Zones 1-5
Travelcard seasons, however, are.

In message ,
writes
I could get rid of the card, my purse would be slightly less
cluttered, and theyre'd be no need to keep queuing. (And if TfL do get
rid of Oyster, they wouldn't be spending money on making all those
cards and readers and gadgets and things, so they'd save money and the
fares could come down anyway.)

But, no. After all, TfL is run by men. And men love gadgets and
gizmos. The more pointless a gadget is, the more men love it. Oyster
is a particularly useless gizmo, so it's no wonder that we're stuck
with it.
Find me someone without "clutter" in their purse, I'll show you a man.
--
Clive

In message ,
Colin Rosenstiel writes
As it happens I travelled to
That's why you didn't need a ticket.
--
Clive

TKD said:

I live in south London, and can't use Oyster for my season ticket to
Croydon, because it's not valid on trains.

You are misinformed. Any season ticket sold on Oyster Card can be
used on the NR trains for all the zones it is valid.

My season ticket isn't valid in ANY zones. It's valid only between my
local station and Croydon.
--

On Mon, 31 Oct 2005 15:16 +0000 (GMT Standard Time),
(Colin Rosenstiel) wrote:

In article ,
(James Farrar) wrote:

On Mon, 31 Oct 2005 10:26 +0000 (GMT Standard Time),
(Colin Rosenstiel) wrote:

This year a one day travelcard from Cambridge with a Network Card
costs £1.65 more than the day return fare to London Terminals. There
is no ticket, Oyster or not, that I can buy in London that gets near
that.

Fair enough - that's a no brainer where the ODTC is at such a small
premium and you need the flexibility.

So why are you worrying about tube singles?

Because on occasion, e.g. twice (on the same visit) this year I couldn't
use Travelcards because they only work with day return tickets from
Cambridge and I needed to make journeys beyond what is permitted on a
Saver Return to Underground Zones 1 and 2. Yesterday and today I am
making such journeys within what is permitted and don't need to buy any
singles.

I suspect you will still disagree on the basis of "too much hassle" but
given that you need an element of "beyond Z12" flexibility I would still
have an Oyster Pre-Pay and load it with the bare minimum amount of value
for the trips you are likely to make and on the final trip allow the
card to go negative. This means you get discounted fares and value from
the deposit - i.e. you're using it rather than TfL banking it. When you
next need to use the card you simply top up again. This obviously
requires a bit of calculation and forward planning on your part and you
could legitimately say "why should I have to worry" but there are
"tunes" you can play with the Oyster concept if you so wish.

This is what I do with my Octopus card in Hong Kong - I run it close to
negative and then use it for my final trip to the Airport to eat into
the deposit. It gets replenished next time I use it - possibly a year
later.

As it happens I travelled to

... the land of invisible people :-)
--
Paul C


Admits to working for London Underground!