On Dec 12, 1:54*pm, MIG wrote:
On 12 Dec, 13:27, John B wrote:



On Dec 11, 11:30*pm, MIG wrote:

On 11 Dec, 16:17, John B wrote:

On Dec 11, 2:09*pm, MIG wrote:

In any case, TfL could easily ensure that Oyster cards were available
for gbp10 with gbp7 credit and gbp20 with gbp17 credit from vending
machines at all airports, mainline terminals and major Tube stations -
and from behind the counter at hotels, ticket stops, etc, packaged
with a 10-language leaflet on how to top them up. That'd be pretty
straightforward for everyone.

(and very few people would bother getting a refund, which is a bonus
from Londoners' perspective.)

That would mean doing something helpful that takes into account
people's circumstances.

That is not the general approach to the introduction of Oyster so far,
so why should it suddenly change?

Yes it is. See: pioneering daily capping; giving people two years to
get used to touching in and out before imposing penalties; ensuring
that top-up machines were fitted in all stations before abolishing
paper seasons; etc.

I know that you've got an irrational phobia of Oyster, but suggesting
that it's made life more rather than less difficult for people, and
has failed to take into account people's circumstances, is simply
false - and TfL has demonstrably offset

Hell, look at the NR roll-out: it's now clear that the vast majority
of NR stations inside the zones will have Oyster top-ups enabled by
January (against the sneering from here 'oooh, you'll have to get a
permit at a Tube station because NR doesn't do Oyster', etc ad
nauseam).

"TfL could easily" have done a number of things that took into account
reality over the the last few years, but they refused.

The only things TfL could've done to make Oyster more useable would've
required the permission of the TOCs, and with DfT refusing to wield
big sticks at them TfL's hands were tied. OEPs are a massive,
ridiculous pain in the arse, as is the fact that new PAYG lines will
be on rail rather than standard Tube payscales. TfL spent years trying
to ensure that they weren't, but ultimately couldn't.

It was, and still is, entirely within TfL's control not to charge
penalty fares to punish people for not using Oyster despite Oyster not
being fully available.

If Oyster is so good, why do they fine people so heavily for not using
it, even when they haven't got the option of using it?

Unless that can be answered, all apologist claptrap is worthless.

They don't. That a simple enough answer?

Seriously: you can't be 'fined' (I'm assuming 'fined' means 'charged a
bit more for your ticket', as the literal definition is just nonsense)
for not using Oyster if you don't have the option of using it.

On the routes where you don't have the option of using Oyster - say,
Crayford to London Bridge - you can buy a CDS or CDR; on the routes
where you do have the option of using Oyster - say, London Bridge to
High Barnet - you can touch in and get the Oyster fare.

Before Oyster, you'd still have needed to buy separate paper tickets
from Crayford-LBG and LBG-High Barnet: nothing has changed. Or you
could have bought a ODTC covering the whole journey, which you still
can: nothing has changed.

Oyster has brought massive benefits to people living within the areas
where it's fully accepted. It's much less relevant to people living in
the areas where it isn't fully accepted, which is the fault of the
TOCs and the DfT and which will finally (mostly) be addressed by
January.

But it hasn't made life *any worse* for people living in the areas
where it isn't accepted. The way it's been implemented, with old-style
NR fares available on all NR routes, with low point-to-point Tube and
bus fares available to anyone with an Oyster card whether they live in
Angel, Bexley or Timbuktu, and with ODTCs still fully available to all
comers, means that it definitionally can't.

You don't seem to take into account the fact that many hundreds of
thousands of people (if not millions) live in places where Oyster is
not available but spend a lot of time in travelling to and perhaps
working in places where non-Oyster ticketing is penalised, either by
hugely hiked fares or by ridiculous inconvenience, like having to get
off to touch in or out.

But all this has been done over and over.

There are no places where Oyster is not available. There are some
places where Oyster is not valid on some or all means of transport.
The whole reason I came up with the example above was because I was
trying, and failing, to find somewhere where non-Oyster users were
subjected to a choice of hugely hiked fares or ridiculous
inconvenience.

The one I missed (and as far as I can see it *is* the only one) is
being the holder of a paper season Travelcard who wants to go outside
their zones on LU/DLR. Yes, that's a pain the way the system is
currently set up. The obvious and completely painless way round it for
people within the zones is to *get your season Travelcard on Oyster*,
which has absolutely no negative effects and solves all your problems.

....which solely leaves people with season Travelcards from outside the
zones. Now, these are z123456, so we're solely talking about the
occasional Tube trip to the wilds of Bucks and Herts. Yes, Oyster has
made life rubbish for those people on those trips. D'you want to
suggest the B/CA on that, because I'm suspecting the C column's not
going to be vast...?

--
John Band
john at johnband dot org
www.johnband.org