"Aidan Stanger" wrote in message
...

Linking it to the topic (but not the subject), Next to Bromley South
station there's a Waitrose (which sometimes had BOGOF minced beef) that
looks like its carpark is partly built on either old railway land or
land that the railway's eventually planned to expand into. Which is it?

I think it was probably a goods yard many years ago, but there's been no
railway use of that land for at least the last 40 years.

Peter

John Ray wrote to uk.transport.london on Sun, 13 Feb 2005:


Strangely (to me), in Paris, there is in effect a supplement charged for
the buses. One ticket will take you right across the city on the Metro,
but 3 tickets may be needed for the same distance on a bus. I have often
wondered why this is.

I know that was the case in the 1970s when I lived there, but I
*thought* - and I could easily be mistaken - that now it was one ticket
per zone, same as the metro?

I've just checked - it is one ticket now, except on the Balabus and four
other lines, the 221, 297, 299, 350 & 351. Don't know where those run,
but the 3-figure numbers tend to be in the suburbs. And you can't
change bus without another ticket.
--
"Mrs Redboots"
http://www.amsmyth.demon.co.uk/
Website updated 23 January 2005 with new photos

On Sun, 13 Feb 2005 15:41:32 +0000, John Ray
wrote:

Ian Jelf wrote:

Although I have some sympathy with such a system, London is so large and
complex (and busy), that charging a supplement for Underground travel
(which is effectively what happens when compared to buses) is I feel
justified in return for the faster journey. (Hamburg has - or had -
something similar for its express buses).

Paris also has no bus-metro transfer beyond the sort of passes available
in London.

Strangely (to me), in Paris, there is in effect a supplement charged for
the buses. One ticket will take you right across the city on the Metro,
but 3 tickets may be needed for the same distance on a bus. I have often
wondered why this is.

This is entirely a guess but I doubt that RATP want to encourage people
to use buses too much. This is simply because the network is nowhere
near as comprehensive as that in London and also it has fairly
restrictive operating hours. Given that a lot of people still live close
in to the centre and that Paris retains its local centres there is less
need for a comprehensive bus service.

In recent years there has been some improvement / expansion of the buses
but it is still the poor relation to the rail network. It gets even
worse once you leave the Paris city area and get to the suburbs. I stay
with friends to the North West of Paris and there is a good RER and SNCF
service but the only RATP bus is once an hour and the local operator
does not provide anything even resembling a bus service when compared to
the sheer excess of service we have in London for the same sort of area.
As an example I catch a SNCF local service from Gare du Nord and then
have to connect one stop by RER. Ideally I'd be able to get a local bus
from the SNCF station which is barely 10 mins by car from my friends
place. However there is NO local bus service between the two places and
I've only ever seen one bus (running off service) at about 8pm. It's
worse than some parts of deregulated Britain!

--
Paul C


Admits to working for London Underground!

On Sun, 13 Feb 2005 12:20:30 GMT, (Neil
Williams) wrote:

On Sun, 13 Feb 2005 12:07:49 +0000, Paul Corfield
wrote:

[1] it was certainly the case when I used to run the fare computer! It
is possible it has changed as a result of Prestige but I somehow doubt
that LU would have removed that part of the system design.

It's not so much whether the "mastering" system can cope, but the vast
array of 10-button "simplified" ticket machines certainly cannot, and
would all have to be replaced.

I acknowledged this point but if you have any memory of the Tube prior
to zonal fares and I just about do then the old set up had arrays of
free standing single fare machine with huge signs above them saying
which stations for that fare. If you were very lucky you had a machine
with 10 buttons on it. It was the case that the same fare applied to a
number of stations even if there were not zones.

There is no direct reason why the most popular cash fares could not go
on the few fare (10 button) machine and the rest would be on the multi
fare. I don't accept that LU would have to replace all the machines -
after all NR ticket machines cannot sell you a ticket to every station
on their part of the network.

--
Paul C


Admits to working for London Underground!

On Sun, 13 Feb 2005 12:40:50 +0000 (UTC), David Jackman
wrote:

Why couldn't the existing system remain for Cash fares but a distance based
one applied for Pre-pay?

It probably could - but is it really worth it?

That said, it could make certain revenue enforcement easier - you
could just say that the price from A to B was X, regardless of which
route you took.

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.

"Aidan Stanger" wrote in message
...

The question is how much group discount should be provided to
attract families - or should it stick to what it's best at. And the
answer really depends on the time of day - when the trains are full,
attracting families is probably best avoided, but when there is spare
capacity, it's often worth putting on special offers in order to attract
more passengers.

TfL certainly try to attract families. An off-peak ODTC (Zones 1-6) costs
GBP6.00. If you take a child with you, you qualify for a Family Travelcard
for GBP4.00 plus GBP0.80 for the child. On Saturdays and Sundays the Family
Travelcard is even better value - the child still needs a ticket, but the
child ticket is free.

Peter

On Sun, 13 Feb 2005 14:42:23 +0000 (UTC), Stephen Osborn
wrote:

But single tickets (i.e. A to B and back either one day or seasonal)
versus travelcards is what this discussion is about.

Oh, true. The thing I was referring to was the rather annoying
situation on the National Rail system where it's often cheaper to
split tickets on a simple, point-to-point single or return journey,
just because the fares system is such a mess.

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.

Paul Corfield writes:

I acknowledged this point but if you have any memory of the Tube prior
to zonal fares and I just about do then the old set up had arrays of
free standing single fare machine with huge signs above them saying
which stations for that fare. If you were very lucky you had a machine
with 10 buttons on it.

Also, IIRC, there were some larger machines which had a button for
every LUL station.

"Aidan Stanger" wrote in message
...

The question is how much group discount should be provided to
attract families - or should it stick to what it's best at. And the
answer really depends on the time of day - when the trains are full,
attracting families is probably best avoided, but when there is spare
capacity, it's often worth putting on special offers in order to attract
more passengers.

TfL certainly try to attract families. An off-peak ODTC (Zones 1-6) costs
GBP6.00. If you take a child with you, you qualify for a Family Travelcard
for GBP4.00 plus GBP0.80 for the child. On Saturdays and Sundays the Family
Travelcard is even better value - the child still needs a ticket, but the
child ticket is free.
(reposted, as it didn't appear at this end first time)

Peter

On Sun, 13 Feb 2005 17:13:19 +0000, Graham Murray
wrote:

Paul Corfield writes:

I acknowledged this point but if you have any memory of the Tube prior
to zonal fares and I just about do then the old set up had arrays of
free standing single fare machine with huge signs above them saying
which stations for that fare. If you were very lucky you had a machine
with 10 buttons on it.

Also, IIRC, there were some larger machines which had a button for
every LUL station.

Well yes but they were part of the Underground Ticketing System
equipment. I was referring to the old stand alone machines in the middle
of ticket halls which printed the yellow oxide tickets.

My first "proper" job with LU involved creating and testing the ticket
machine data. As part of that I had to stand at a machine and press
every ticket combination on the multi fare machines, read out the fare
to the colleague who checked that it was right. You could say I've
bought a ticket from every station to every other one on the
Underground! You got rather sore fingers and arms ;-)

--
Paul C


Admits to working for London Underground!