Dave Arquati wrote:

-- via Zone 1 singles from £3 to £4 (!)
-- bus singles from £1.50 to £2

Now that really is taking the ****. Why don't they just abolish cash
fares if that's what they want to do? It's nothing but an underhand
and dishonest tourist tax.

(Yes, I do have an Oyster card. And a Strippenkaart (that I'm using a
bit more often of late ), and (somewhere) a Singapore EZ-Link; I
won't be paying these rip-off fares. Regardless of this, it doesn't
stop me believing that they are inappropriate, and that Ken/TfL need a
kick over them).

- Under-16s get a 50p Tube single or £1 daily cap on Oyster

I'm not convinced by this, nor by the free bus fares. Why shouldn't
teenagers pay (or have paid) their own way? In most of mainland Europe
they'd be paying full adult fare by age 12.

- £4 penalty charge to be introduced on Oyster PAYG for those who do not
touch in and out (from November this year)
- TOCs will introduce zonal fares in January 2007, thus paving the way
for an easy PAYG rollout

Both not surprising, and probably necessary[1], though for the former
they will *have* to get their machine network and staff up to scratch
and have a way to "back out" of an Oyster transaction more easily, e.g.
if you go through the barriers then find there's no service. The
latter happened to me at Richmond, where there was no LUL due to
lightning damage so SWT were (so said the staff) passing pax including
Oyster Pre-Pay.

[1] Maybe a better option would be to charge the maximum fare that
could have been incurred by passing through the barriers at which you
touched in; that would be fairer, IMO, and it's what Singapore does.

Neil