I am a Canadian now living over here,and in Toronto (where I'm from) we have
our transit system (the busses and tube) running on a single fare system
where for about 80p gets you anywhere the transit runs in town on any and
all connecting routes.It seems absoultely horrendous that we here in London
have to pay through the nose by paying for every bus we hop on when other
cities around the world have similar systems around the world are similar to
Toronto (one fare covers destination to destination travel instead of one
fare per ride).Does anyone else think this is highway robbery?
Glen (not Gay)


--
I was an only child.....eventually!

gay merrington wrote:

we here in London
have to pay through the nose by paying for every bus we hop on when other
cities around the world have similar systems around the world are similar to
Toronto

Yes, London transport is one of the most expensive, but you can get an off-peak
travel card for bus and tube in zones 1/2 for £4.70.

I've been to Toronto - there is only a small metro system and the buses take
ages to get round a huge city. Took us 2 hours to get to the zoo, i recall.

M.

marcb wrote:
gay merrington wrote:

we here in London
have to pay through the nose by paying for every bus we hop on
when other cities around the world have similar systems around the
world are similar to Toronto

Yes, London transport is one of the most expensive, but you can get
an off-peak travel card for bus and tube in zones 1/2 for £4.70.

Any Travelcard is valid for buses in *all* zones. A one-day Bus Pass
costs £3 which I would not call highway robbery.

Are the fares in Toronto subsidised out of taxation revenue?
--
Richard J.
(to e-mail me, swap uk and yon in address)

On Fri, 20 May 2005, gay merrington wrote:

I am a Canadian now living over here,and in Toronto (where I'm from) we
have our transit system (the busses and tube) running on a single fare
system where for about 80p gets you anywhere the transit runs in town on
any and all connecting routes.It seems absoultely horrendous that we
here in London have to pay through the nose by paying for every bus we
hop on when other cities around the world have similar systems around
the world are similar to Toronto (one fare covers destination to
destination travel instead of one fare per ride).Does anyone else think
this is highway robbery?

Yes. Not the prices, or the difference in price between tube and bus
tickets, which are a function of the different costs and business model
here, but the lack of through tickets for buses or multimodal trips (or a
system of 'transfers', which is how it's handled in Vancouver).

Tube tickets are more or less fine - you pay a price based on zonal
distance, then you use however many trains it takes to get there. That's
how it should be. Buses, however, are not fine - you pay per leg, not for
the whole journey, so i might have to pay two or three times as much for a
journey as someone else making one of similar length, just because TfL
decided to give him a direct service rather than me - talk about adding
insult to injury!

It's just as bad if you want to go multimodal - if your trip is between LU
and NR stations, you can use any combination of tubes and trains, i think,
but you can't, AIUI, use a train as part of an LU-LU trip (not that
there's ever a pressing need to), and you can't make buses or trams part
of your journey either.

And before someone starts bleating about travelcards - i'm talking about
simple journeys. People shouldn't have to buy a bleeding travelcard to
make a single journey cost-effectively!

tom

--
20 Minutes into the Future

Tom Anderson wrote:
On Fri, 20 May 2005, gay merrington wrote:

I am a Canadian now living over here,and in Toronto (where I'm from)
we have our transit system (the busses and tube) running on a single
fare system where for about 80p gets you anywhere the transit runs
in town on any and all connecting routes.It seems absoultely
horrendous that we here in London have to pay through the nose by
paying for every bus we hop on when other cities around the world
have similar systems around the world are similar to Toronto (one
fare covers destination to destination travel instead of one fare
per ride).Does anyone else think this is highway robbery?

Yes. Not the prices, or the difference in price between tube and bus
tickets, which are a function of the different costs and business
model here, but the lack of through tickets for buses or multimodal
trips (or a system of 'transfers', which is how it's handled in
Vancouver).

Tube tickets are more or less fine - you pay a price based on zonal
distance, then you use however many trains it takes to get there.
That's how it should be. Buses, however, are not fine - you pay per
leg, not for the whole journey, so i might have to pay two or three
times as much for a journey as someone else making one of similar
length, just because TfL decided to give him a direct service rather
than me - talk about adding insult to injury!

It's just as bad if you want to go multimodal - if your trip is
between LU and NR stations, you can use any combination of tubes and
trains, i think, but you can't, AIUI, use a train as part of an LU-LU
trip (not that there's ever a pressing need to), and you can't make
buses or trams part of your journey either.

And before someone starts bleating about travelcards - i'm talking
about simple journeys. People shouldn't have to buy a bleeding
travelcard to make a single journey cost-effectively!


For a LU to LU journey is buying a Travelcard in some way more difficult
than buying a point to point ticket?

On Fri, 20 May 2005 11:03:00 +0100, "gay merrington"
wrote:

Does anyone else think this is highway robbery?

Yes, I think it is very poor to penalise people for making journeys
that require a change over those who do not, though there is the
logistical issue of avoiding people passing interchange tickets on to
other passengers on exiting the bus.

However, this is the traditional way in which buses tend to be
operated in the UK in most locations - transfer tickets are rare
(though day tickets are quite common). Old habits die hard.

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.

On Fri, 20 May 2005 11:32:10 +0000 (UTC), "Brimstone"
wrote:

For a LU to LU journey is buying a Travelcard in some way more difficult
than buying a point to point ticket?

It isn't, but it's quite possibly more expensive.

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.

Richard J. wrote:
marcb wrote:

gay merrington wrote:


we here in London
have to pay through the nose by paying for every bus we hop on
when other cities around the world have similar systems around the
world are similar to Toronto

Yes, London transport is one of the most expensive, but you can get
an off-peak travel card for bus and tube in zones 1/2 for £4.70.


Any Travelcard is valid for buses in *all* zones. A one-day Bus Pass
costs £3 which I would not call highway robbery.

Are the fares in Toronto subsidised out of taxation revenue?

Yes, but by comparatively little in comparison with most systems in North
America - a little over 80% of the TTC's income comes from the farebox, I believe.

--

Stephen

BEN: You know why I wanted to become a doctor?
MINION: Flattering drawstring pants?

A one-day bus pass is £3.00. Not too bad, perhaps, but that's still £15.00 a
week if you use if every weekday.

If I want to go from home to, say, the Strand, I can do it with one bus
trip. If I travel after 9:30, and use my Oyster prepay, it's 80p, so there
and back is £1.60. It doesn't take much working out to see that this is a
lot less than £3.00. If I did this every day for a week I would save £7.00.

However, if I want to go to, say, Gower Street, that's two bus rides, total
cost £1.60. I often walk to save the mone, or use a bus which takes me
almost there but not quite. It's stupid that I have to do this. Ok, it's
only 80p, but twice a day, every day, it soon adds up.

I can understand that TfL might be worried that people would pass their
"transfers" to friends or even sell them, although, for some reason, this
doesn't seem to worry bus operators in North America. But with my Oyster
card, this could be done automatically - no paper ticket, so nothing to pass
on to someone else, no risk of misuse. If they can do "daily capping" with
Oyster, they could do transfers. It seems that it's just tradition that
stops them.

-- Philip

"Neil Williams" wrote in message
...
On Fri, 20 May 2005 11:32:10 +0000 (UTC), "Brimstone"
wrote:

For a LU to LU journey is buying a Travelcard in some way more difficult
than buying a point to point ticket?

It isn't, but it's quite possibly more expensive.

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.

Pingle wrote to uk.transport.london on Sat, 21 May 2005:

A one-day bus pass is £3.00. Not too bad, perhaps, but that's still £15.00 a
week if you use if every weekday.

So if you think you're going to, you buy a weekly bus pass for £11.00,
saving £4.00. Or a monthly one for £42.30, saving even more - and in
both cases you can use buses to your heart's content, and trams, and at
weekends....

I usually buy a monthly bus pass simply for the convenience!
--
"Mrs Redboots"
http://www.amsmyth.demon.co.uk/
Website updated 3 April 2005