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or whatever it's called.

today for the first time evah there is a flat fare for buses in London. All of 'em cost a quid innit.

Is this a good thing or a bad thing?

― MarkH (MarkH), Sunday, 4 January 2004 22:45 (twenty-one years ago)

It costs me £3.80 for a return train ticket to Exeter. That's 18 miles.

― Nick Southall (Nick Southall), Sunday, 4 January 2004 22:49 (twenty-one years ago)

OR:

You Londinium folk are all bastards and have it easy.

― Nick Southall (Nick Southall), Sunday, 4 January 2004 22:50 (twenty-one years ago)

I think this may well be all part of a ploy to say, you buy a bus pass or an oyster card or a ticket from a machine by the bus stop or you pay the earth and the price differential will increase with each successive annual fare "revision". One thing I notice whenever I travel by bus in London is that hardly anyone is paying cash...the vast majority are flashing their passes, which is definitely not the case in Oxford.

― MarkH (MarkH), Sunday, 4 January 2004 22:54 (twenty-one years ago)

£3.80 to Exeter! It cost me £37! Mind you, that's 200 miles. I think they should have left well alone with London buses. Bucking fastards!

― Badger (Badger), Monday, 5 January 2004 02:09 (twenty-one years ago)

I would be very surprised if they ever put the fares up again. £1 is quick. Even vis a vis change from a fiver its easy.

― Pete (Pete), Monday, 5 January 2004 09:48 (twenty-one years ago)

So my 10-minute busride to college will no longer cost just 70p? I have hoarded change for NOTHING. I will now have to start walking there. Feh.

― sgs (sgs), Monday, 5 January 2004 11:15 (twenty-one years ago)

£1 is indeed quick. having to listen to passengers whinging about the increase aside, I'd imagine that the staff love the increase to a quid as most ppl are going to have a pound coin in their pocket if they have any change at all. Will this pave the way to exact change only coin in the box like they have in Birmingham and Nottingham?

― MarkH (MarkH), Monday, 5 January 2004 11:18 (twenty-one years ago)

Hopefully not.

― William Bloody Swygart (mrswygart), Monday, 5 January 2004 11:20 (twenty-one years ago)

One thing I notice whenever I travel by bus in London is that hardly anyone is paying cash...the vast majority are flashing their passes, which is definitely not the case in Oxford.

It's been the same here in Edinburgh since the city buses introduced direct-debit bus passes: almsot everyone who gets on a bus either has a pass or is a pensioner (and so gets free bus travel anyway). I think the passes are about £30 per month.

― caitlin (caitlin), Monday, 5 January 2004 11:22 (twenty-one years ago)

sarah buy the saver ticket packs - they've gone up i think too from like 65p to 70p, but they're cheaper.

If i take the bus I'll need a bus pass anyway, because even though the 29 is SUPPOSED to take me door to door from home to work (holloway -> hampstead road) about 2/3 of them terminate at camden! i.e. I'll need 2 buses or wait 10 hours for one that goes the whole way (which are always packed like a can of beans anyway).

and of course to buy the bus pass I'll have to walk round to the shop, and then go back to outside my house to get on the bus, cos they have no ticket machine there and they don't sell passes on the bus.

/whingewhinge

― ken c (ken c), Monday, 5 January 2004 11:31 (twenty-one years ago)

I know not these saver pass things. I shall look into them, and avoid further walking for now. Thanks Ken!

― sgs (sgs), Monday, 5 January 2004 11:40 (twenty-one years ago)

http://www.oystercard.com/buy_1_2.php

you can BUY THEM ON YOUR COMPUTER ken, thus not having to leave the house at all.

― CarsmileSteve (CarsmileSteve), Monday, 5 January 2004 11:44 (twenty-one years ago)

Four week passes are £33 in Edinburgh but if you pay by direct debit it works out at about £29 a month. I find myself getting the bus to places i really could walk to to make sure i get my money's worth out of the bus pass, it panders to my laziness.

― leigh (leigh), Monday, 5 January 2004 11:56 (twenty-one years ago)

so if you pay in cash, can you get a transfer? or do you have to pay £1 for each leg of your bus ride? 'cause that sucks ass.

― Catty (Catty), Monday, 5 January 2004 12:21 (twenty-one years ago)

read the small prints steve ;)

*You are not able to buy Discount Travelcards, Discount Bus Passes or adult rate Bus Passes online.

nope, you can't do a transfer at all. each leg costs the full arm and a leg. It's like £2 to travel 3 miles.

I ride my bike to work nowadays anyway, and only take the bus when the weather's horrendous. (albeit that being most days)

― ken c (ken c), Monday, 5 January 2004 12:25 (twenty-one years ago)

that bloooooooooooooooooooooows.
Looks like it's oyster card for me then. or one hell of a walk.

― Catty (Catty), Monday, 5 January 2004 12:28 (twenty-one years ago)

Wowser, I just renewed my Oystercard at the machine at Gt Portland St and pressed the View Usage button. Cripes, all my movements for the last week! They're spying on us! It even said which book I was reading on the 322!

― Michael Jones (MichaelJ), Monday, 5 January 2004 12:29 (twenty-one years ago)

i'm reading about the whole pre pay oyster card, and it all sounds a bit confusing to me. so if i get an oyster card and put £10 on it now, i'm guaranteed 2003 prices for all of 2004? or is it just the money i put on in january or whenever the deadline is that will allow me cheaper travel?

probably obvious, but i'm really sleep-deprived right now, and it's really showing today.

― colette (a2lette), Monday, 5 January 2004 12:30 (twenty-one years ago)

i think they mean that you'd be charged at the old prices this year. it's to encourage you to get an oyster card rather than using paper tickets and it goes on until the end of 2004.

― ken c (ken c), Monday, 5 January 2004 12:37 (twenty-one years ago)

and it's really easy to scam your mates through the turnstyles, as the doors stay open as long as you've got the card down on the pad thingy.

It's also fun to fuck with the people who have paper tickets in front of you: if you slap your card down before they pull their ticket out, I think they lose a turn.

not that I would do either of these things, because IT WOULD BE WRONG.

― Catty (Catty), Monday, 5 January 2004 13:12 (twenty-one years ago)

Oyster card - the perfect crime

1. robber and accomplice enter picadilly circus station, robber has oyster, accomplice has paper travelcard.
2. upon going through the gates, robber and accomplice swap cards.
3. accomplice takes the picadilly line to heathrow airport terminal 4.
4. robber takes a scenic route to come out of oxford street station, 20 minutes later, robber holds up topshop and takes all cash from the till, leather gloves and a black and white stripey jumper.
5. robber takes tube to paddington.
6. robber takes heathrow express to heathrow airport.
7. accomplice exits tube, using robber's oyster card.
8. robber makes sure he is seen on Heathrow tube CCTV.
9. robber and accomplice take (seperate) planes to somewhere far away, with the cash.

PERFECT ALIBI.

― ken c (ken c), Monday, 5 January 2004 15:45 (twenty-one years ago)

You'll rue being so specific about the stripey top. Why not a mask and a bag marked Swag?

― Pete (Pete), Monday, 5 January 2004 15:49 (twenty-one years ago)

ah, so i can wait for a while (maybe till they do pre pay for busses) and then i'll get 2003 fares? sounds ok to me, i don't use the tube that much anyway. but a pre pay bus saver card that i could do online would be nice.

― colette (a2lette), Monday, 5 January 2004 16:12 (twenty-one years ago)

i have emailled the oysterpeople to ask why we can't do monthly bus passes on line. i shall Report Back once i have the answer.

― CarsmileSteve (CarsmileSteve), Monday, 5 January 2004 16:14 (twenty-one years ago)

you should've phoned them. i find you get a more direct response that way.

― stevem (blueski), Monday, 5 January 2004 16:19 (twenty-one years ago)

robber and accomplice need masks, too. and little cabbie caps. and they need to laugh in a sinsister manner as they dance and scramble around the tube while the bobbies run into each other and shake their sticks in anger to the tune of the Benny Hill theme. Maybe they can go back and forth across a hallway lined with doors, too.

― Catty (Catty), Monday, 5 January 2004 16:27 (twenty-one years ago)

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