On Dec 17, 3:27*pm, Mizter T wrote:
On 17 Dec, 12:29, David Cantrell wrote:

On Tue, Dec 16, 2008 at 09:11:43AM -0800, Mizter T wrote:

However one thing that's worth bearing in mind is that Oyster-derived
usage data is used by TfL to assess demand and ridership on the bus
network

Ahhh, so *that* explains why TfL don't seem to care about people in
south London - because fewer of us have Oyster cards (instead we have
proper paper travelcards bought at railway stations), we can't be
counted.

I would think that TfL are well aware of the potential pitfalls on
over-reliance on Oyster derived travel data and thus take this into
account. As Barry Salter said earlier, those with paper season
Travelcards are sometimes asked to complete a travel diary (though
perhaps this is only for those with monthlies or longer) - as he said
sometimes given out at stations and they also sent by post to people
who hold such tickets (the incentive is something like a gift token or
being entered into a prize draw or the like).

Me thinks TfL do care about people in south London, the basic problem
is that rail services south of the Thames are not their
responsibility, though they do have an input into them (and have spent
lots of money on them - lots of station upgrades have been at least
partially financed by TfL money). And of course the old Mayor would
have been quite happy to get his hands on as much of the suburban rail
network south of the river as possible and run it as a London
Overground style service - in particular there were hopes that the
Southern Metro services might get transferred to TfL. That was not to
be, but many of the improvements that the new Southern franchise
promises - in particular more staff at stations and the refurbishment
or modernisation of said stations - were likely the result of heavy
lobbying of DfT Rail by TfL and the then Mayor.

The rail services south of the Thames are not TfL's responsibility,
but the situations in which people from south of the Thames get
punished are TfL's responsibility (and easily mitigated, like
extensions to paper travelcards, but they refuse to make any
accommodation).

Maybe they think that it's a way of putting indirect pressure of the
NR TOCs to comply with their demands.

Trouble is that punishing populations because you don't like the
authorities that they happen to live under doesn't generally result in
them rising up against their own authorities. They are more likely to
resist and despise those who are punishing them (spot the parallel).