More Transport for London musings
OK, so I've been a bit back on reporting on TfL happenings and paranoia, but it is that time of the year again (almost) - fares increase day, which happens on Tuesday 2nd January for the bus & tube passengers of London. I've already blogged about the changes to train and train/tube fares in Greater London a few months back, but this is the first time I've mentioned TfL's annual hike. This year, cash passengers will pay more, but those with pre-pay Oyster cards will not. Thus, a cash fare on a London bus increases from £1.50 to £2.00 (any distance). If you use your pre-pay credit on your Oyster card, the price remains unchanged at £1.00. The Oyster card will automatically "cap" the credit deducted at £3.00 per day - 50p less than the paper One Day Bus Pass ("cap" and pass prices unchanged). A tube journey (to/from or within Zone 1 only) increases from £3.00 to £4.00. With Oyster cards, the price is not changed at £1.50-£3.50 (peak) or £1.50-£2.00 (off-peak).
During our training on the Underground, many of us were surprised to learn that the bulk of the income does not come from commuters, but tourists and visitors. Of course, occasional visitors to the city will not go for an Oystercard. Even if they could understand how to get one, and how to get your £3 deposit back when the time came to fly home - what would they do with the £3 anyway?
The reducing of fares for young people continues, with the continuing of free travel on buses for all under 18-year-olds in full-time education, and a new 50p Oyster single fare for all under-16s on the Tube, with a £1.00 per day price "cap". From Easter 2007, free Tube and DLR travel will be offered to all under 11-year-olds at all times. Downloading the full booklet gives you all the details.
The BBC have mentioned the rise, and one of the associated stories to this was a link to a story about the RMT (once again) objecting to the Public-Private Partnership funding of the tube. "The Rail Maritime and Transport Union (RMT) said Metronet and Tube Lines, the firms responsible for maintaining the network, had "spectacularly failed"."
"RMT general secretary Bob Crow said the move had resulted in "deterioration in service, missed targets, infrastructure failure, engineering overruns, an alarming increase in safety problems and a massive increase in costs." Mr Crow added that the government must "bring the necessary legislation forward to end the PPP and return the Tube's infrastructure to London Underground".
A TfL spokesperson said: "TfL's position on the PPP is clear. It is not the system we would have chosen to finance and manage the renewal of the Tube. But once the government transferred the Underground to TfL under PPP, we have done all we can to make it work. "
That was the interesting bit - back to my time once more! - but the Mayor wanted a bonds issue. Subseuqent press releases show TfL have been using bonds to raise funding, but the government did lumber them with PPP. Metronet have recently been criticised after another day of exceptionally poor performance last month (one I'd missed out on before this), in which Mayor Ken said "Unless there is evidence of a marked improvement it is inconceivable that things can carry on... to say to Londoners there will be another 12 years of this is inconceivable,". Bob Crow from the RMT did sum it up brilliantly though - "What's £1m to a firm that makes more than that in profits every week?"
Now you know why we had those strikes, back in the day. That was more than five years ago now...
During our training on the Underground, many of us were surprised to learn that the bulk of the income does not come from commuters, but tourists and visitors. Of course, occasional visitors to the city will not go for an Oystercard. Even if they could understand how to get one, and how to get your £3 deposit back when the time came to fly home - what would they do with the £3 anyway?
The reducing of fares for young people continues, with the continuing of free travel on buses for all under 18-year-olds in full-time education, and a new 50p Oyster single fare for all under-16s on the Tube, with a £1.00 per day price "cap". From Easter 2007, free Tube and DLR travel will be offered to all under 11-year-olds at all times. Downloading the full booklet gives you all the details.
The BBC have mentioned the rise, and one of the associated stories to this was a link to a story about the RMT (once again) objecting to the Public-Private Partnership funding of the tube. "The Rail Maritime and Transport Union (RMT) said Metronet and Tube Lines, the firms responsible for maintaining the network, had "spectacularly failed"."
"RMT general secretary Bob Crow said the move had resulted in "deterioration in service, missed targets, infrastructure failure, engineering overruns, an alarming increase in safety problems and a massive increase in costs." Mr Crow added that the government must "bring the necessary legislation forward to end the PPP and return the Tube's infrastructure to London Underground".
A TfL spokesperson said: "TfL's position on the PPP is clear. It is not the system we would have chosen to finance and manage the renewal of the Tube. But once the government transferred the Underground to TfL under PPP, we have done all we can to make it work. "
That was the interesting bit - back to my time once more! - but the Mayor wanted a bonds issue. Subseuqent press releases show TfL have been using bonds to raise funding, but the government did lumber them with PPP. Metronet have recently been criticised after another day of exceptionally poor performance last month (one I'd missed out on before this), in which Mayor Ken said "Unless there is evidence of a marked improvement it is inconceivable that things can carry on... to say to Londoners there will be another 12 years of this is inconceivable,". Bob Crow from the RMT did sum it up brilliantly though - "What's £1m to a firm that makes more than that in profits every week?"
Now you know why we had those strikes, back in the day. That was more than five years ago now...
posted by Suzy Scott @ 14:07
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