Took a relative to the LT museum in covent garden on the w/e. They looked
a bit bemused when I asked why couldn't I pay using my Oyster card. Given
TfL seem to want to promote Oyster as electronic cash wouldn't this be
a logical place to start? They could even have proper station gates at the
entrance to let oyster holders through so they don't have to queue and make
the gates part of the exhibits at the same time. An opportunity missed I
think.

B2003

wrote in message
...
Took a relative to the LT museum in covent garden on the w/e. They looked
a bit bemused when I asked why couldn't I pay using my Oyster card. Given
TfL seem to want to promote Oyster as electronic cash wouldn't this be
a logical place to start? They could even have proper station gates at the
entrance to let oyster holders through so they don't have to queue and
make
the gates part of the exhibits at the same time. An opportunity missed I
think.

B2003


There might be the "small" matter of the cost of the gates. Doubtless
someone more informed can put an actual price on this, but my recollection
is that each Oyster gate costs several tens of thousands of pounds, which
might not be the best investment, particularly at the moment. Having said
that, I seem to recall that when the Victoria line was opened in 1969 some
form of the "new" gates were used at the Clapham transport museum to gain
entrance. However I am not sure that these were the full monty - possibly a
simplified mock up.

In message , at
10:58:07 on Mon, 9 Apr 2012, J Lynch
remarked:
I seem to recall that when the Victoria line was opened in 1969 some
form of the "new" gates were used at the Clapham transport museum to gain
entrance. However I am not sure that these were the full monty - possibly a
simplified mock up.

Somewhere I think I've got one of the tickets they used to sell. And you
are right about the mechanism - in practice all it would need to do is
accept a correctly-sized bit of card.

Either there, or maybe in Covent Garden later, they had a cutaway model
of one of the Victoria Line ticket readers, showing how it flipped the
ticket internally so it could be read properly, whichever orientation it
was presented by the passenger.
--
Roland Perry

In article , (Roland Perry)
wrote:

Either there, or maybe in Covent Garden later, they had a cutaway
model of one of the Victoria Line ticket readers, showing how it
flipped the ticket internally so it could be read properly, whichever
orientation it was presented by the passenger.

Whereas nowadays the data density on the card should be more than enough to
make it readable in any orientation.

--
Colin Rosenstiel

In message , at 06:54:30
on Mon, 9 Apr 2012, remarked:
Either there, or maybe in Covent Garden later, they had a cutaway
model of one of the Victoria Line ticket readers, showing how it
flipped the ticket internally so it could be read properly, whichever
orientation it was presented by the passenger.

Whereas nowadays the data density on the card should be more than enough to
make it readable in any orientation.

More to do with the cost (in those days) of having read heads both sides
of the ticket path and enough computer power to decode a ticket going
through backwards.
--
Roland Perry

In message , at 11:54:54 on Mon, 9 Apr
2012, Roland Perry remarked:
I seem to recall that when the Victoria line was opened in 1969 some
form of the "new" gates were used at the Clapham transport museum to gain
entrance. However I am not sure that these were the full monty - possibly a
simplified mock up.

Somewhere I think I've got one of the tickets they used to sell. And
you are right about the mechanism - in practice all it would need to do
is accept a correctly-sized bit of card.

Either there, or maybe in Covent Garden later, they had a cutaway model
of one of the Victoria Line ticket readers, showing how it flipped the
ticket internally so it could be read properly, whichever orientation
it was presented by the passenger.

I was conflating a few things there, and now I've found the tickets.

Classic cardboard ones for the Clapham museum (not sure why the
different colours, and what does "Clapham Cl" stand for?)

And a special exhibition at the Science Museum, where you were given an
"Underground Ticket of the Future" (with magnetic stripe covering the
whole of the rear side) which you could put through the mock-up gates I
mentioned above.

http://yfrog.com/hws5gfj
--
Roland Perry

"Roland Perry" wrote in message
...
In message , at 11:54:54 on Mon, 9 Apr 2012,
Roland Perry remarked:
I seem to recall that when the Victoria line was opened in 1969 some
form of the "new" gates were used at the Clapham transport museum to gain
entrance. However I am not sure that these were the full monty - possibly
a
simplified mock up.

Somewhere I think I've got one of the tickets they used to sell. And you
are right about the mechanism - in practice all it would need to do is
accept a correctly-sized bit of card.

Either there, or maybe in Covent Garden later, they had a cutaway model of
one of the Victoria Line ticket readers, showing how it flipped the ticket
internally so it could be read properly, whichever orientation it was
presented by the passenger.

I was conflating a few things there, and now I've found the tickets.

Classic cardboard ones for the Clapham museum (not sure why the different
colours, and what does "Clapham Cl" stand for?)

And a special exhibition at the Science Museum, where you were given an
"Underground Ticket of the Future" (with magnetic stripe covering the
whole of the rear side) which you could put through the mock-up gates I
mentioned above.

You know you're getting old when the "predicted" future has come .... and
gone again

tim

On 08/04/2012 21:52, d wrote:
Took a relative to the LT museum in covent garden on the w/e. They looked
a bit bemused when I asked why couldn't I pay using my Oyster card. Given
TfL seem to want to promote Oyster as electronic cash wouldn't this be
a logical place to start? They could even have proper station gates at the
entrance to let oyster holders through so they don't have to queue and make
the gates part of the exhibits at the same time. An opportunity missed I
think.

At one point you certainly *could* pay for admission to the LT Museum
using Oyster...not that I ever made use of the facility, being a member
of the Friends. Seems to have stopped with the last big redisplay project.

Cheers,

Barry

"Paul Corfield" wrote in message
...
On Sun, 8 Apr 2012 20:52:34 +0000 (UTC), d
wrote:

Took a relative to the LT museum in covent garden on the w/e. They looked
a bit bemused when I asked why couldn't I pay using my Oyster card. Given
TfL seem to want to promote Oyster as electronic cash wouldn't this be
a logical place to start? They could even have proper station gates at the
entrance to let oyster holders through so they don't have to queue and
make
the gates part of the exhibits at the same time. An opportunity missed I
think.

Except that your museum ticket entitles you to free re-entry to the
museum for a year. Oyster doesn't have that capability.
--
Paul C

Well yes, but the problem isn't insoluble. It may be daft but the gate (or
a separate machine just inside) could produce a receipt/ticket for re-entry
(the "fare" would be on a PAYG basis) and if you used a variant of the gates
that have appeared at Kings X that have card readers, magnetic stripe
readers and bar code readers I'm certain the "separate printer" could be
made to produce one of those three formats.

I've no doubt that there are other problems to resolve related to back
office accounting but again, none of it is insoluble.

What's the real problem? Naysayers and a lack of will? No, money.

The New York Transit Museum allows -- or did allow -- one to pay their
entrance with a subway token.

Don't know what it is now, since they have discontinued tokens.