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New fares (with ES spin...)
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New fares
Jim wrote:
http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/news/articles/13301604 The official announcement (TfL press release) is at http://www.tfl.gov.uk/tfl/press-rele...a-21-sep.shtml with details of all the fares at http://www.tfl.gov.uk/tfl/downloads/...ares-table.pdf -- Richard J. (to e-mail me, swap uk and yon in address) |
New fares (with ES spin...)
"Jim" wrote in message
... http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/news/articles/13301604 I don't understand how the ES can describe putting bus fares up from 100p to 120p before 9:30am and down from 100p to 80p after 9:30am as "Bus Fares Soar". Free bus travel for all under 16? That is a diabolically bad idea... buses will become unsafe for anyone else, that's if there's room for anyone else. If they only gave free travel to under-16s who have been in no trouble with the police or school, that might be an idea. -- John Rowland - Spamtrapped Transport Plans for the London Area, updated 2001 http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Acro...69/tpftla.html A man's vehicle is a symbol of his manhood. That's why my vehicle's the Piccadilly Line - It's the size of a county and it comes every two and a half minutes |
New fares (with ES spin...)
On Tue, 21 Sep 2004 15:22:57 +0100, "John Rowland"
wrote: "Jim" wrote in message ... http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/news/articles/13301604 I don't understand how the ES can describe putting bus fares up from 100p to 120p before 9:30am and down from 100p to 80p after 9:30am as "Bus Fares Soar". The point though is that cash fares rise 20p or 20%; AM peak Oyster pre pay fares rise 30p to £1 so nearly 50% while even off peak Pre Pay fares rise 10p or 14%. No matter which way you view it I'd say they were pretty big rises. Of course the Evening Standard will do anything to make a headline but I think they are partly justified in making a bit of noise about this. Clearly the financial settlement from government is not being directed at the bus network - looks like we are stuck with what we've got today with not a lot of room for improvement for the next 4 years. Free bus travel for all under 16? That is a diabolically bad idea... buses will become unsafe for anyone else, that's if there's room for anyone else. If they only gave free travel to under-16s who have been in no trouble with the police or school, that might be an idea. While I understand the social exclusion arguments about keeping child fares down I do not agree with the policy of free fares for under 11 year olds never mind increasing it progressively to under 18s by 2006. I trust Ken will be funding the increase in insurance and vandalism costs in certain areas of London where youths and children already wreak wanton damage on buses and related infrastructure. I feel sorry for the bus drivers - how to make a tough job even more unattractive. -- Paul C Admits to working for London Underground! |
New fares (with ES spin...)
John Rowland wrote:
"Jim" wrote in message ... http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/news/articles/13301604 I don't understand how the ES can describe putting bus fares up from 100p to 120p before 9:30am and down from 100p to 80p after 9:30am as "Bus Fares Soar". Try reading the TfL documents (see my earlier post) rather than the ES spin. On buses, cash fares go up from £1 to £1.20 all day. Pre-pay goes up from 70p to 80p (£1 in the morning peak). Saver goes up from 70p to £1 all day (43% rise). -- Richard J. (to e-mail me, swap uk and yon in address) |
New fares (with ES spin...)
John Rowland wrote:
Free bus travel for all under 16? That is a diabolically bad idea... buses will become unsafe for anyone else, that's if there's room for anyone else. If they only gave free travel to under-16s who have been in no trouble with the police or school, that might be an idea. There are two advantages to me: 1) Stops them going to school/piano lessons or whatever in mummy's car 2) Encourages ownership of public transport for kids, making for better treatment of vehicles and a higher likelihood they will use public transport when they are older. I find your generalisations of young people surprising, almost disturbing, but perhaps I've failed to pick up on a nuance of your post or history. Dan |
New fares (with ES spin...)
"John Rowland" wrote in message ... "Jim" wrote in message ... http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/news/articles/13301604 ... Free bus travel for all under 16? That is a diabolically bad idea... buses will become unsafe for anyone else, that's if there's room for anyone else. If they only gave free travel to under-16s who have been in no trouble with the police or school, that might be an idea. I understand what you mean; strikes me this is the teenage vandals' dream come true. Now they don't even have to pay before they get on, go upstairs and scratch the windows/paint graffiti everywhere. I am tempted to conclude whoever thinks this is a good idea has never travelled on a bus in SE London. And to think we'll all be paying for them too... (and before someone says 'not all kids do this', I would completely agree and say it's a relatively tiny minority of teenagers. However, this relatively tiny minority cause widespread damage running into hundreds of thousands of pounds; we simply cannot ignore that and allow this serious problem with bus vandalism to escalate in order to provide free bus travel for all IMO). The situation with public transport vandalism in SE London is quite simply dire. |
New fares (with ES spin...)
On Tue, 21 Sep 2004 17:58:36 +0000 (UTC),
wrote: In article , (Paul Corfield) wrote: On Tue, 21 Sep 2004 15:22:57 +0100, "John Rowland" wrote: "Jim" wrote in message ... http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/news/articles/13301604 I don't understand how the ES can describe putting bus fares up from 100p to 120p before 9:30am and down from 100p to 80p after 9:30am as "Bus Fares Soar". The point though is that cash fares rise 20p or 20%; AM peak Oyster pre pay fares rise 30p to £1 so nearly 50% while even off peak Pre Pay fares rise 10p or 14%. No matter which way you view it I'd say they were pretty big rises. In 2003 the fare was 80p cash In 2004 the fare was 70p cash In 2005 the fare will be 120p cash. This will be a 50% rise on the 2003 fares and a 70% rise on the 2004 fares for the many people who pay cash. It's just a rip-off. You cannot pay 70p cash for any fare in 2004. The cash fare is £1 London wide. You only pay 70p if you opt for a Saver pre-paid ticket or Oyster pre-pay. Therefore the cash fare increase is 20%. The prepay etc. fares are just a smoke screen. It's like a firm saying - "look, we haven't put our prices up this year but, for those of you not paying by direct debit you'll now pay another £2/month!" Well yes but the objective is to get the remaining 15% of passengers out of cash and into some form of pre-payment. Providing access to such cheaper alternatives is as easy and convenient as possible then it is a reasonable policy objective. It ceases to be so if passengers are seriously inconvenienced - and it is my view that is the case already with the poorly thought out cashless zone in central London. -- Paul C Admits to working for London Underground! |
New fares
Richard J. wrote:
Jim wrote: http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/news/articles/13301604 The official announcement (TfL press release) is at http://www.tfl.gov.uk/tfl/press-rele...a-21-sep.shtml with details of all the fares at http://www.tfl.gov.uk/tfl/downloads/...ares-table.pdf I never realised that for a bus commuter travelling twice a day for the five working days, Pre-Pay (in both 2004 & 2005) is cheaper than a Bus Pass! It's interesting that season Travelcard price increases are high for inner zones but lower for many zones, whereas the opposite seems to be true for Day Travelcards (up from £5.40 to £6.00 for off peak all zone!). ISTR there used to be a £4.50 minimum fare for YP Railcard-discounted OP Day Travelcards - I assume this will increase in 2005 as the cheapest OPDT is now £4.70. The zone changes aren't anywhere near as drastic as I thought - just some fare simplification. Interestingly, on Pre Pay, single fares from Zones 6 & 4 to Zone 1 have decreased as a result of the simplification. *However* a whole new range of complication has been introduced with Pre Pay "peak" & "off peak". For example, if you're travelling at midday from Z6 to Z1 and back at 5pm, Pre Pay will be more expensive (£7) than a travelcard (£6) - but travelling out at 12.00 and back at 20.00, Pre Pay will be cheaper (£5.50). Although this will be confusing for the semi-regular or irregular user, it could present *significant* savings for people working outside normal hours (which I guess is the point!). Someone travelling from Z6 to Z1 for work for 07.00 (starting their journey before 06.30) and finishing at 15.00 (£2 + £3.50) would save £12 off the weekly travelcard price - some 30%! Obviously this saving would reduce if they made extra journeys, but leisure journeys at evenings would easily be absorbed (3 return journeys into Z1). Incidentally, using prepay for a Z6-1 return journey on a 9am-5pm working day would still result in a £4.50 saving, although this would be useless if the passenger broke journeys for some reason or make more than one return leisure trip. It will be interesting to see if capping extends to seven-day travelcards as with the new peak/offpeak system it could present benefits for early starters, late finishers or shift workers. -- Dave Arquati Imperial College, SW7 www.alwaystouchout.com - Transport projects in London |
New fares (with ES spin...)
On Tue, 21 Sep 2004, Rich Mallard wrote:
"John Rowland" wrote in message ... "Jim" wrote in message ... http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/news/articles/13301604 ... Free bus travel for all under 16? That is a diabolically bad idea... buses will become unsafe for anyone else, I understand what you mean [...] (and before someone says 'not all kids do this', I would completely agree and say it's a relatively tiny minority of teenagers. Good to hear we all understand that. However, this relatively tiny minority cause widespread damage running into hundreds of thousands of pounds; we simply cannot ignore that and allow this serious problem with bus vandalism to escalate in order to provide free bus travel for all IMO). So, because of the actions of a tiny number of criminals, you'd deny this benefit to hundreds of thousands of children? In any case, i just don't believe that this is going to lead to more vandalism. Are you saying that the yobs, if they can't find a quid for a bus fare, are just going to say "Oh bother! I rather suppose we can't vandalise a bus today; let's go home and read improving books."? No - they're just going to go off and vandalise something else, or vandalise the outside of a bus, or else hop on a bus anyway and fare-dodge. Moreover, i suspect that this image of gangs roaming round London, getting on buses specifically to vandalise them, is erroneous: i suspect that these kids are using the bus anyway (to get to school, or go to the park, or visit their dealer, or whatever), and simply take the opportunity to vandalise it, like a dog ****ing all over the place when it's being taken for a walk. Free travel won't get them on the bus more, it just means their mums'll have more cash to spend on fags. On which subject: dogs should be banned in London. In fact, in all urban areas. I'll allow guide dogs. tom ps Shall we start cross-posting this thread to uk.prejudice? -- curry in a sack |
New fares (with ES spin...)
On Tue, 21 Sep 2004, Dan Gravell wrote:
John Rowland wrote: Free bus travel for all under 16? That is a diabolically bad idea... buses will become unsafe for anyone else, that's if there's room for anyone else. If they only gave free travel to under-16s who have been in no trouble with the police or school, that might be an idea. There are two advantages to me: 1) Stops them going to school/piano lessons or whatever in mummy's car Surely the kind of mum who drives her kids to school isn't going to send them on the bus purely because it now costs a quid a day less? They'd have to mix with all those common people! 2) Encourages ownership of public transport for kids, making for better treatment of vehicles and a higher likelihood they will use public transport when they are older. Interesting. People seem to be assuming that making travel free for kids will make kids travel more - that there's elasticity in the market. I'd have thought that demand is already saturated; people _need_ to use the bus to get around, so they do. Making it free will just make it cheaper for them. In particular, i suspect Ken believes that spend on bus travel as a fraction of income is highest amongst the poorest people in London (which seems plausible - the absolute expense is probably constant, so the poorer you are, the greater the relative expense; also, better-off people are more likely to use other modes), and thus that this is essentially a progressive tax break; redistribution by the back door. Not that there's anything wrong with that, of course! I find your generalisations of young people surprising, almost disturbing, but perhaps I've failed to pick up on a nuance of your post or history. Hmm; 'nuance' isn't the word i'd have chosen ... :) tom -- curry in a sack |
New fares
Richard J. wrote:
Jim wrote: http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/news/articles/13301604 The official announcement (TfL press release) is at http://www.tfl.gov.uk/tfl/press-rele...a-21-sep.shtml with details of all the fares at http://www.tfl.gov.uk/tfl/downloads/...ares-table.pdf I forgot to mention one of the most important things in my previous post! "Following groundbreaking talks with the train operating companies, a simpler pricing structure will be introduced for rail/Tube journeys which will reduce the cost of some trips." No mention yet of any details, but this promises to be interesting - following on from the recent introduction of the validity of Tube single tickets on the North London Line and West London Line down to West Brompton. -- Dave Arquati Imperial College, SW7 www.alwaystouchout.com - Transport projects in London |
New fares (with ES spin...)
On Tue, 21 Sep 2004 14:49:34 GMT Richard J.
said... Saver goes up from 70p to £1 all day (43% rise). The message there is to stock up on Saver tickets before January '05 as there is no "Use By" date. The same applied at the beginning of this year though only a 5p rise from 65p to 70p. Presumably Pass Agents have to buy their stocks of Bus Savers off LUL as the sales are not accounted for through their ticket issuing system? Therefore on that basis agents would get to make a huge profit if they stocked up at the before the price rise and sold them on after January. -- Phil Richards London, UK Home page: http://www.philrichards1.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk |
New fares (with ES spin...)
How has this affected tourist travelcard (bought from abroad) prices?
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New fares (with ES spin...)
"Chris" wrote in message ... How has this affected tourist travelcard (bought from abroad) prices? Oops just read right at the bottom that the visitor travelcard is being replaced. These price increases do make me wonder where all the money from the con charge (which was supposed to improve transport) has gone though. |
New fares (with ES spin...)
On Tue, 21 Sep 2004 20:22:43 +0100 Chris said...
How has this affected tourist travelcard (bought from abroad) prices? The London Visitor's Travelcard which is marketed to UK-bound tourists will be abolished (along with the Weekend Travelcard) and is replaced by a new 3-day Travelcard from January 2005. Of course the Visitor's Travelcard isn't as straight forward as the ones you buy in London as there are various discount vouchers thrown in as part of the package. -- Phil Richards London, UK Home page: http://www.philrichards1.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk |
New fares (with ES spin...)
On Tue, 21 Sep 2004 20:22:43 +0100, "Chris"
wrote: How has this affected tourist travelcard (bought from abroad) prices? The press release notes say that the visitor travelcard and weekend travelcard are replaced by the new 3 day travelcard and the normal 7 day travelcard (only relates to the 7 day visitor travelcard). I'm not hugely surprised by the loss of the 7 day Visitor Travelcard as many tourists simply got a normal travelcard once in London. The new 3 day ticket looks a bit dodgy to me - if you look at the pricing it is most odd. You get a discount for zones 1 and 2 but you get sod all discount for other zonal or time combinations. I don't understand why anyone would buy one for Z1-6 other than to avoid queuing up on subsequent days. I suspect this is another way of pushing up income by getting rid of a ticket that is considered to be over discounted. I also note the lack of commentary about Family Travelcards - perhaps these are now abolished given that most children will go free by bus and thus the Travelcard is, in effect, a rail only product for children aged 16 or less. -- Paul C Admits to working for London Underground! |
New fares (with ES spin...)
In article ,
(Paul Corfield) wrote: On Tue, 21 Sep 2004 17:58:36 +0000 (UTC), wrote: In article , (Paul Corfield) wrote: On Tue, 21 Sep 2004 15:22:57 +0100, "John Rowland" wrote: "Jim" wrote in message ... http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/news/articles/13301604 I don't understand how the ES can describe putting bus fares up from 100p to 120p before 9:30am and down from 100p to 80p after 9:30am as "Bus Fares Soar". The point though is that cash fares rise 20p or 20%; AM peak Oyster pre pay fares rise 30p to £1 so nearly 50% while even off peak Pre Pay fares rise 10p or 14%. No matter which way you view it I'd say they were pretty big rises. In 2003 the fare was 80p cash In 2004 the fare was 70p cash In 2005 the fare will be 120p cash. This will be a 50% rise on the 2003 fares and a 70% rise on the 2004 fares for the many people who pay cash. It's just a rip-off. Sorry, I got the years wrong. It should have been: 2002 - 80p - 50% rise 2003 - 70p - 70% rise Roger You cannot pay 70p cash for any fare in 2004. The cash fare is £1 London wide. You only pay 70p if you opt for a Saver pre-paid ticket or Oyster pre-pay. Therefore the cash fare increase is 20%. The prepay etc. fares are just a smoke screen. It's like a firm saying - "look, we haven't put our prices up this year but, for those of you not paying by direct debit you'll now pay another £2/month!" Well yes but the objective is to get the remaining 15% of passengers out of cash and into some form of pre-payment. Providing access to such cheaper alternatives is as easy and convenient as possible then it is a reasonable policy objective. It ceases to be so if passengers are seriously inconvenienced - and it is my view that is the case already with the poorly thought out cashless zone in central London. -- Paul C Admits to working for London Underground! |
New fares
Dave Arquati wrote to uk.transport.london on Tue, 21 Sep 2004:
I never realised that for a bus commuter travelling twice a day for the five working days, Pre-Pay (in both 2004 & 2005) is cheaper than a Bus Pass! If, and only if, you only need to use one bus to complete your journey. For me, going to Streatham several times a week, it always needs two buses or a longer walk than I've often time for - so I buy a bus pass (which may not be cost-effective, but is simple!). -- "Mrs Redboots" http://www.amsmyth.demon.co.uk/ Website updated 11 September 2004 |
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On Tue, 21 Sep 2004 23:20:10 +0100, Tom Anderson
wrote: If there was an off-peak season travelcard with a reasonable saving, i'd definitely go for that, because i get the same security at a lower cost, and i wouldn't be clogging up the system. Merseytravel offer such a thing at a very heavily discounted price, as do many of the German Verkehrsverbuende (normally sold as CC-Karten, though I have no idea what those initials stand for). I must say that the fare structure still strikes me as confusing, and not at all well-suited for implementation onto smart-card ticketing. IMO, London still needs to look to the rest of Europe, especially Germany, for its example. Fewer fare levels (OK, the flattening of the zones is a start) and through-ticketing/unified pricing by all modes is IMO the way forward. Neil -- Neil Williams in Milton Keynes, UK To e-mail use neil at the above domain |
New fares (with ES spin...)
"Tom Anderson" wrote in message
... Interesting. People seem to be assuming that making travel free for kids will make kids travel more - that there's elasticity in the market. I certainly would have used them more if they were free when I was a child. In fact, I still would. But that's me. In cold or rainy weather, buses will make far superior places for teenagers to hang about than outside. -- John Rowland - Spamtrapped Transport Plans for the London Area, updated 2001 http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Acro...69/tpftla.html A man's vehicle is a symbol of his manhood. That's why my vehicle's the Piccadilly Line - It's the size of a county and it comes every two and a half minutes |
New fares (with ES spin...)
"Richard J." wrote in message
... But the whole point of the fare structure is to encourage people not to use cash fares. The cost of a daily bus pass has gone from GBP2 to GBP3 in a short period of time (2 years?), and I don't see how that can be explained in terms of wanting to discourage cash fares. Incidentally, this is the first time ever that the bus fare structure is so complex that I don't fully understand it! But I can see I'll have to abandon Saver Tickets, with which I am very happy, for Pre Pay. So I'll have to grasp the nettle of some new technology, even though my current public transport usage is one midday return bus journey once a week -- John Rowland - Spamtrapped Transport Plans for the London Area, updated 2001 http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Acro...69/tpftla.html A man's vehicle is a symbol of his manhood. That's why my vehicle's the Piccadilly Line - It's the size of a county and it comes every two and a half minutes |
New fares (with ES spin...)
Sorry, I got the years wrong. It should have been: 2002 - 80p - 50% rise 2003 - 70p - 70% rise Mind you I remember in 1999 the bus fare (outside Zone 1) was 90p.... then it went down to 70p, so really in 5 years it's gone up 30p |
New fares (with ES spin...)
"Paul Corfield" wrote in message ... The prepay etc. fares are just a smoke screen. It's like a firm saying - "look, we haven't put our prices up this year but, for those of you not paying by direct debit you'll now pay another £2/month!" Well yes but the objective is to get the remaining 15% of passengers out of cash and into some form of pre-payment. So why the ****ting hell is it still not possible to put one day bus passes/travelcards on Oyster? These are surely the most popular, and very often best value tickets for the occasional or semi-frequent traveller, but the entire Pre Pay system excludes them - outside of this notion of 'capping' which was promised months ago, but which I fear will ne'er be introduced. BTN |
New fares (with ES spin...)
"Tom Anderson" wrote in message ... In particular, i suspect Ken believes that spend on bus travel as a fraction of income is highest amongst the poorest people in London (which seems plausible - the absolute expense is probably constant, so the poorer you are, the greater the relative expense; also, better-off people are more likely to use other modes), and thus that this is essentially a progressive tax break; redistribution by the back door. Not that there's anything wrong with that, of course! I consider there to be quite a lot wrong with the constant redistribution of my money to people that I despise, and who probably aren't too keen on me either, despite my constant subsidising them, the ****ing ungrateful hypocrites. Something that every elected administration at every level has seen fit to do, one way or another. BTN |
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--- "Sir Benjamin Nunn" wrote: So why the ****ting hell is it still not possible to put one day bus passes/travelcards on Oyster? These are surely the most popular, and very often best value tickets for the occasional or semi-frequent traveller, but the entire Pre Pay system excludes them - outside of this notion of 'capping' which was promised months ago, but which I fear will ne'er be introduced. Yes. Oyster is currently useless for me. Even if capping is introduced, it still won't do me much good. I don't live anywhere near a tube station, so I'd have to pay for a paper NR return to central London, and then use Oyster on the tube or bus section of the journey through Z1. Or buy a Travelcard season on Oyster, knowing that I'll only get full use out of it for one or two days each week! It'd probably still be cheaper to buy a paper One Day Travelcard, just as I do now. |
New fares (with ES spin...)
On Wed, 22 Sep 2004 12:11:21 +0100, "Sir Benjamin Nunn"
wrote: "Paul Corfield" wrote in message .. . The prepay etc. fares are just a smoke screen. It's like a firm saying - "look, we haven't put our prices up this year but, for those of you not paying by direct debit you'll now pay another £2/month!" Well yes but the objective is to get the remaining 15% of passengers out of cash and into some form of pre-payment. So why the ****ting hell is it still not possible to put one day bus passes/travelcards on Oyster? I have no idea - why don't you ask TfL why they aren't doing what you demand? -- Paul C Admits to working for London Underground! |
New fares (with ES spin...)
John Rowland wrote:
"Tom Anderson" wrote in message Interesting. People seem to be assuming that making travel free for kids will make kids travel more - that there's elasticity in the market. I certainly would have used them more if they were free when I was a child. In fact, I still would. But that's me. And me. Though at 3p a throw I was able to make as many journeys as I had time for without spending all my pocket money. Then the incentive was RTs. Now it would be RMs, if only for a few months. Colin McKenzie -- The great advantage of not trusting statistics is that it leaves you free to believe the damned lies instead! |
New fares (with ES spin...)
Tom Anderson wrote:
On Tue, 21 Sep 2004, Dan Gravell wrote: John Rowland wrote: Free bus travel for all under 16? That is a diabolically bad idea... buses will become unsafe for anyone else, that's if there's room for anyone else. If they only gave free travel to under-16s who have been in no trouble with the police or school, that might be an idea. There are two advantages to me: 1) Stops them going to school/piano lessons or whatever in mummy's car Surely the kind of mum who drives her kids to school isn't going to send them on the bus purely because it now costs a quid a day less? They'd have to mix with all those common people! 2) Encourages ownership of public transport for kids, making for better treatment of vehicles and a higher likelihood they will use public transport when they are older. Interesting. People seem to be assuming that making travel free for kids will make kids travel more - that there's elasticity in the market. I'd have thought that demand is already saturated; people _need_ to use the bus to get around, so they do. Making it free will just make it cheaper for them. Unfortunately you're wrong. Adelaide introduced free travel for kids in 1990, but abolished it the following year because things hadn't gone according to plan. With free buses, kids started using the bus for short journeys where they'd otherwise have walked. |
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