Anonymouse wrote:
On Sun, 22 Oct 2006 15:53:52 +0100, Richard wrote:
[my rant about 35% fare increase]

Did you not read the press release? Fares are not - on average -
increasing.

I did, but I didn't notice that statement the first time I read it. I
am surprised though - maybe my assumption was wrong, but a significant
proportion of journeys, particularly at peak times, are straight into
zone 1, and these are the fares that see the biggest rises. Where the
rise is less, or there's a decrease, it seems to me that it's a journey
with a significant radial part, "around" a zone, or indeed across
London, so that a fare determined by distance can be a lot more than one
based on the number of zones travelled through. Good luck to those with
such a journey!

I can see how, considering every pair of stations, there is on average
no increase, but I would have thought that the most popular journeys
have more increases than decreases. If this is not the case, then I
apologise and take it back - except I still wonder about the use of
rail-only not-really-zonal fares when proper integration should be the goal.

I wonder why TravelWatch consider that "complexity is reduced
significantly"? Unless the fares are marketed as zonal, which it seems
they cannot be completely, I'm not sure how the average passenger will
notice a difference.

Richard.