Northern Oyster (s)

[AGH]

When I travel abroad or even in London, connectivity between types of transport and multiple changes is a given. For instance last summer travelling in Barcelona I changed twice to get to my hotel from the Airport including a massive change at Collblanc using multiple escalators. Didn't think twice that it was necessary.

Area based ticketing makes it so much easier so why can't the North have one similar system?

I would suggest movement around the north would be much easier if there was perhaps three Oyster style areas.

Northwest - covering Manchester, Liverpool and Preston. Limits would be Chester, Crewe, Buxton, Hebbden Bridge and Preston but including the Fylde peninsular.

Leeds and Sheffield - To York, Shipley, Hull for example

North East - Newcastle, Sunderland and Middlesbrough.

These seem the natural geographic areas and should at points butt up against each other.

You could have city zones (like London and Manchester tram) and concentric zones around each

Simplifying ticketing to tap in / smart card so you just get charged per zone you cross. Ticketing between major zones (3 above) could also be simplified.

With Northern and TPE the majority TOCs in this area and already politically aligned authorities controling theses areas co-operation is theoretically possible. Trams in these areas are LA controlled plus bus companies due to amalgamation again are fewer in number.

Surely with Oyster running so well in the SE then this could be done in these areas with the same tech albeit the 4 bit system I understand Oyster uses may need upgrading.

Missed opportunity or way too big a challenge?

9.5m live in Greater London and about 11m in this area so scale is similar.

 

[Fawkes Cat]

Not a bad idea at all, although people will be along shortly to ask about the level of penalty for those who don't tap in (answer - you have a maximum penalty for each zone and rigorous ticket checks between zones. Those caught pay the penalty for the zones since the last rigorous check of the train). But I would suggest that the way of delivery should be by credit/debit card or equivalent on your mobile phone (anyone without one of these can buy and load a prepaid card online or in a supermarket). Now that contactless payments are a thing, and plenty of transport systems use them, there's no reason to have the expense and complexity of creating your own cards.

 

[Mal75756]

An excellent idea, and maybe the zones could be simply Manchester (Lancs), Preston (NW), Leeds (WY), Doncaster/Sheffield (SY), Hull (EY). one charge for one zone and two for two etc.
just tapping in and out would make life so simple and may add more people to the trains which we all want.

 

[xotGD]

Tap in/tap out tickets are available on Northern, but these are just the flexi season tickets between specific stations.

With cheap advances available even on peak commuter services I have never needed to get one.

Also, the availability of advances would discourage the use of an Oyster style system.

 

[Fawkes Cat]

With cheap advances available even on peak commuter services I have never needed to get one.

Also, the availability of advances would discourage the use of an Oyster style system.

An interesting view, in that the impression I've got from many postings on this forum is that the added complexity of booked-train-only tickets outweighs the benefit of the cheap fares that short-distance Advance tickets give

But there's no reason why pre-booked tickets (whether on paper or displayed on your phone) and touch-in/out travel shouldn't co-exist: TfL seems to cope. So unless pre-booked cheap Advances are a vast part of the market and won't be displaced by the convenience of tapping and going this needn't be a showstopper.

 

[AGH]

I use smart card Tec for my season ticket on Northern and it works better than QR codes at barriers although slower on the train. Technology is there already it seems and NFC is built into every smartphone

 

[xotGD]

An interesting view, in that the impression I've got from many postings on this forum is that the added complexity of booked-train-only tickets outweighs the benefit of the cheap fares that short-distance Advance tickets give

But there's no reason why pre-booked tickets (whether on paper or displayed on your phone) and touch-in/out travel shouldn't co-exist: TfL seems to cope. So unless pre-booked cheap Advances are a vast part of the market and won't be displaced by the convenience of tapping and going this needn't be a showstopper.

I agree that the two can coexist. But if buying advances can save you three quid to catch the trains you were planning to catch anyway, it is worth spending five minutes to book rather than using the tap in tap out card.

 

[Fawkes Cat]

I agree that the two can coexist. But if buying advances can save you three quid to catch the trains you were planning to catch anyway, it is worth spending five minutes to book rather than using the tap in tap out card.

This is, of course, a judgement of how much people think their time is worth. So while you may well be right, we have to allow for the possibility that people will not find it worth spending five minutes to save £3.

 

[furnessvale]

Is it beyond the wit of man to have ONE nationwide card, including London, and have the computer systems geared up to allocate revenue as appropriate?