--- Phil Richards said...
Solar Penguin wrote:

And even better still for LUL to adopt point-to-point instead of all
that zone nonsense.

Why not be silly enough to suggest that London Buses go back to a
system of fare tables for each route?

What's silly about that? In the present system, even if you just take a
*local* bus ride, just a couple of stops or so, you have to pay the same
as a journey the *whole length* of the bus route! Think how much money
you could save if you only paid for the short journey you actually
travel, instead of all those miles you don't!


Remember zonal fares in London have been in force for over 20
years now

And that's what scientists call "the Concorde fallacy", i.e. "We've been
trying, without any success, to make this thing work for so many years
now, that it's pointless to give up now, even though when we finally do
get something that works, it won't be worth all the effort we've put
into it!"

Face it, twenty years is *too* long. It's definitely time to get rid of
the zones by now. Long overdue in fact.


the TOCs are the ones dragging their feet in not fully adapting
to a proper integrated fare structure which you'll find
commonplace in many European cities.

We should have a proper integrated fare structure, true. But it should
be based on point-to-point fares, not zones.

Face facts, the zones are just a con to make us pay for distances we
haven't travelled. For example, you get on an East London Line train at
New Cross to travel across the river to Wapping. But you can't buy a
ticket to Wapping. Instead, you have to buy a Zone Two ticket that's
valid beyond Wapping, all the way to Bromley-by-Bow! And no chance of
getting a refund on the unused portion of your ticket.

Another example, you have a choice of fast Metropolitan Line trains or
slow Jubilee Line trains when travelling from Wembley Park to Baker
Street. Common sense says that the faster trains should be more
expensive. That way, any customers who want to save money can use the
cheaper, slower trains. But because of the stupid zonal system, we all
end up paying to travel on the Metropolitan trains, with no option for a
cheaper ticket.

Yes, the zones work for maximising LUL's profit, but are crap at giving
good value to customers. No truly fair fares can ever come out of it.
(Admittedly, the NR TOCs aren't always fair in practice either, but at
least a fair point-to-point system could be made. That's impossible
with a zonal system, and always will be.)

On Sun, 9 Jan 2005 10:16:48 -0000, "Solar Penguin"
wrote:

What's silly about that? In the present system, even if you just take a
*local* bus ride, just a couple of stops or so, you have to pay the same
as a journey the *whole length* of the bus route! Think how much money
you could save if you only paid for the short journey you actually
travel, instead of all those miles you don't!

I'd agree with that, but I think a more sensible arrangement (less
complex, and easier to understand, while fairer) would be to have a
few levels of fares defined either in terms of the Zones or in the way
some European systems do - by having a "short journey" ticket for
journeys involving no changes and up to a set number of stops in
addition to the full price ticket.

Face it, twenty years is *too* long. It's definitely time to get rid of
the zones by now. Long overdue in fact.

I disagree, and most European transport operations would also do so.

We should have a proper integrated fare structure, true. But it should
be based on point-to-point fares, not zones.

Face facts, the zones are just a con to make us pay for distances we
haven't travelled. snip

Do you know how the point-to-point fares system on, say, National Rail
works?

The answer is that it is based on a system of "key stations" for
longer-distance fares. Thus, a local station will have fares to
destinations within a limited radius of itself. It will then have key
stations from which it gains its longer-distance fares, which may
themselves have key stations from which they gain even longer-distance
fares. Often, there is no add-on fare for the additional distance
between the origin and the key station, or no discount for the
distance not travelled to the key station.

It would be a nightmare to manage a full set of separate fares to and
from every station on the National Rail system without doing this
unless we went to a kilometric system. There are arguments for this,
of course, but it too has its disadvantages.

Fare stages on buses have disadvantages as well - let's say there are
two bus routes from a city to a given estate or village, but one takes
a bit longer than another by going via a number of other estates. The
shorter journey is cheaper because there are fewer fare stages passed.
Why should the passenger be penalised for taking the longer route?
All most passengers want to do is travel from A to B as quickly as
feasible at their given departure/arrival time. The product being
sold is movement from A to B, not the actual bus ride, and traditional
fare stages are often incompatible with that.

Another example, you have a choice of fast Metropolitan Line trains or
slow Jubilee Line trains when travelling from Wembley Park to Baker
Street. Common sense says that the faster trains should be more
expensive.

Why?

In my mind, an integrated city transport system should involve modes
feeding modes with a single fare structure. The fare for a given
journey should be for the optimum journey, which in the case above is
the faster service. On a journey originating off LUL, that may
involve a combination of train, bus, tram and Tube.

"Encouraging" people to travel on slower services is only sensible
where the fast service is much more overcrowded than the slower one,
and it works both ways. Indeed, Virgin Trains used to have a cheaper
specific fare from Macclesfield to Manchester (they may still do) to
fill empty seats. This made it *cheaper* than the local service.

Indeed, I'd simplify it further to one fare set for all modes. A
single ticket (be it zonal or based on short/normal journey length)
would be valid by all modes for as many changes as required to
complete the single journey. To protect against fraud it could have a
time limit (say you must be on the last mode within 2 hours).

Separate bus and Tube fares only make sense in the context of wanting
to attract people off a crowded Tube, and even then (there is some
justification there) I find it ridiculous that one is effectively
penalised (unless using a one day bus pass or ODTC) for using
connections on buses or using a bus and a Tube. This is particularly
pertinent if there is no direct bus service between the start and end
of a given journey, because the passenger is being penalised because
TfL won't provide a direct bus, not for any fault of their own.

Neil

--
Neil Williams in Milton Keynes, UK
When replying please use neil at the above domain
'wensleydale' is a spam trap and is not read.

Neil Williams wrote:
On Sun, 9 Jan 2005 10:16:48 -0000, "Solar Penguin"
wrote:


What's silly about that? In the present system, even if you just take a
*local* bus ride, just a couple of stops or so, you have to pay the same
as a journey the *whole length* of the bus route! Think how much money
you could save if you only paid for the short journey you actually
travel, instead of all those miles you don't!


I'd agree with that, but I think a more sensible arrangement (less
complex, and easier to understand, while fairer) would be to have a
few levels of fares defined either in terms of the Zones or in the way
some European systems do - by having a "short journey" ticket for
journeys involving no changes and up to a set number of stops in
addition to the full price ticket.


Face it, twenty years is *too* long. It's definitely time to get rid of
the zones by now. Long overdue in fact.


I disagree, and most European transport operations would also do so.


We should have a proper integrated fare structure, true. But it should
be based on point-to-point fares, not zones.

Face facts, the zones are just a con to make us pay for distances we
haven't travelled. snip


Do you know how the point-to-point fares system on, say, National Rail
works?

The answer is that it is based on a system of "key stations" for
longer-distance fares. Thus, a local station will have fares to
destinations within a limited radius of itself. It will then have key
stations from which it gains its longer-distance fares, which may
themselves have key stations from which they gain even longer-distance
fares. Often, there is no add-on fare for the additional distance
between the origin and the key station, or no discount for the
distance not travelled to the key station.

It would be a nightmare to manage a full set of separate fares to and
from every station on the National Rail system without doing this
unless we went to a kilometric system. There are arguments for this,
of course, but it too has its disadvantages.

Fare stages on buses have disadvantages as well - let's say there are
two bus routes from a city to a given estate or village, but one takes
a bit longer than another by going via a number of other estates. The
shorter journey is cheaper because there are fewer fare stages passed.
Why should the passenger be penalised for taking the longer route?
All most passengers want to do is travel from A to B as quickly as
feasible at their given departure/arrival time. The product being
sold is movement from A to B, not the actual bus ride, and traditional
fare stages are often incompatible with that.


Another example, you have a choice of fast Metropolitan Line trains or
slow Jubilee Line trains when travelling from Wembley Park to Baker
Street. Common sense says that the faster trains should be more
expensive.


Why?

In my mind, an integrated city transport system should involve modes
feeding modes with a single fare structure. The fare for a given
journey should be for the optimum journey, which in the case above is
the faster service. On a journey originating off LUL, that may
involve a combination of train, bus, tram and Tube.

"Encouraging" people to travel on slower services is only sensible
where the fast service is much more overcrowded than the slower one,
and it works both ways. Indeed, Virgin Trains used to have a cheaper
specific fare from Macclesfield to Manchester (they may still do) to
fill empty seats. This made it *cheaper* than the local service.

Indeed, I'd simplify it further to one fare set for all modes. A
single ticket (be it zonal or based on short/normal journey length)
would be valid by all modes for as many changes as required to
complete the single journey. To protect against fraud it could have a
time limit (say you must be on the last mode within 2 hours).

Separate bus and Tube fares only make sense in the context of wanting
to attract people off a crowded Tube, and even then (there is some
justification there) I find it ridiculous that one is effectively
penalised (unless using a one day bus pass or ODTC) for using
connections on buses or using a bus and a Tube. This is particularly
pertinent if there is no direct bus service between the start and end
of a given journey, because the passenger is being penalised because
TfL won't provide a direct bus, not for any fault of their own.

I believe TfL are planning a reduced fare for a combined bus + Tube
journey using prepay, but this could be a while off as they wait for
each new Oyster product to "embed" itself (initial prepay, then bus
prepay, then peak bus fares, and then probably capping).

A discounted "through" bus fare would be excellent but could be open to
abuse - if it were based on a reasonable time allowance (say, 45 mins
between touching in on the first bus and the second) then you could make
a short bus journey, get off and do something, and get back on the
return bus.

--
Dave Arquati
Imperial College, SW7
www.alwaystouchout.com - Transport projects in London

On Mon, 10 Jan 2005 00:25:13 +0000, Dave Arquati
wrote:

A discounted "through" bus fare would be excellent but could be open to
abuse - if it were based on a reasonable time allowance (say, 45 mins
between touching in on the first bus and the second) then you could make
a short bus journey, get off and do something, and get back on the
return bus.

I wonder does the Oyster store enough information about a bus journey
to disallow "changing" onto the same route as you describe?

Neil

--
Neil Williams in Milton Keynes, UK
When replying please use neil at the above domain
'wensleydale' is a spam trap and is not read.

In article ,
Neil Williams wrote:
I wonder does the Oyster store enough information about a bus journey
to disallow "changing" onto the same route as you describe?

That's not sufficent; I could use the 257 in one direction and the
WsomethingIforget the other.

--
Mike Bristow - really a very good driver

On Mon, 10 Jan 2005 12:31:47 +0000 (UTC), Mike Bristow
wrote:

That's not sufficent; I could use the 257 in one direction and the
WsomethingIforget the other.

OK, how about a radical change? Replace the single with a 2-hour
ticket, and legitimise what you suggest. They do that in Prague.

Neil

--
Neil Williams in Milton Keynes, UK
When replying please use neil at the above domain
'wensleydale' is a spam trap and is not read.

--- Neil Williams said...


OK, how about a radical change? Replace the single with a 2-hour
ticket, and legitimise what you suggest. They do that in Prague.


That's no good. It would *still* overcharge people making a local
journey, just like the present system does. They'd pay for two hours
but only travel for 15 minutes, and no chance of a refund on the unused
time!

A system based on point-to-point fares is the only honest option.

(Neil Williams) wrote in
:

I wonder does the Oyster store enough information about a bus journey
to disallow "changing" onto the same route as you describe?

I will detect that you get on the same bus twice.
I was on a bus that was delayed whilst a policeman issued a ticket to
the driver (jumping a red light). I got off and walked to the next stop
hoping another bus would come. When I got on the original bus it
gave an error message

A

A discounted "through" bus fare would be excellent but could be open to
abuse - if it were based on a reasonable time allowance (say, 45 mins
between touching in on the first bus and the second) then you could make
a short bus journey, get off and do something, and get back on the
return bus.

Some while back there was some discussion about capping on the Yahoo!
Tramlink group. At the moment the requirement (*) for passengers to
touch-in before every leg of a tram journey makes Pre-Pay more expensive
than paper tickets for those journeys requiring a change of tram. When
capping comes along this anomaly is supposed to be corrected. We couldn't
figure out anyway this could be done unless time allowances are used in the
way you describe for a possible "through" bus fare in which case the 'abuse'
you describe would inevitably be possible. However I don't think we need to
consider it an 'abuse' at all. It sounds like a very attractive improvement
to the fare model to me.

(*) Why there is such a requirement is baffling of course when the Pre-Pay
card must carry just as much information as a printed ticket, yet just the
latter is accepted for through journeys. Clearly feeder buses might be an
issue, but not changes of tram.

Dave Arquati wrote in :


I believe TfL are planning a reduced fare for a combined bus + Tube
journey using prepay, but this could be a while off as they wait for
each new Oyster product to "embed" itself (initial prepay, then bus
prepay, then peak bus fares, and then probably capping).

A discounted "through" bus fare would be excellent but could be open to
abuse - if it were based on a reasonable time allowance (say, 45 mins
between touching in on the first bus and the second) then you could make
a short bus journey, get off and do something, and get back on the
return bus.


I assume it is too much to expect this to mean that one fare would allow
unlimited travel for an hour (the way many continental systems work) but we
will see yet more complexity added to an already over complex system?

(some systems, I think Berlin, now explicitly disallow a return journey for
the one fare, even if within the hour)