Heathrow to Zone 1 — three options, three fares

[pyxbiz]

OK, I'm landing at Heathrow, Terminal 2, Plan to buy an Oystercard at the rail station there for £5, add another £5 for pay-as-you-go, then load a Zone 1-3 7-day Travelcard for £43.50 (or whatever the price will be). Now I'm faced with three options:

1. Ride the old slow way to Central London on the Piccadilly Line ~55 minutes.
2. Ride the faster route on the new Elizabeth Line, ~29 minutes.
3. Ride the fastest way on the Heathrow Express, same route as the Elizabeth Line but without stopping, ~15 minutes.

Then there are the fares: Piccadilly cheapest, Elizabeth Line in the middle, Heathrow Express most expensive.

How to decide? Well, of course, it all depends on my priorities: What is more valuable to me, time or money? But the devil is in the details. I'd like to save time, of course, but not at huge extra expense. And I'd like to travel cheaply, but not if it takes forever. So...:

Without a Zone 1-3 Travelcard, the fare on the Piccadilly Line from Heathrow to Zone 1 would be £6.
Without a Zone 1-3 Travelcard, the fare on the Elizabeth Line from Heathrow to Zone 1 would be £11.60.
Heathrow Express is always £25.

I'm tending toward taking the Elizabeth Line as the best compromise: Not as outrageously expense as Heathrow Express, but not as interminably long as the Piccadilly Line.

But now I have a question. Since I will have a Zone 1-3 Travelcard, presumably I won't have to pay the full fare from Zone 6 (Heathrow) to Zone 1, but instead just Zone 6 to Zone 3, at which point my Travelcard will cover the rest of the journey. For situations such as this, one is charged "extension fares" (is that the right term?) out of your pay-as-you-go balance on your Oystercard. So my questions are:

What is the extension fare to go from Heathrow to Zone 1 on the Piccadilly Line if you have a pre-loaded Zone 1-3 Travelcard?
and
What is the extension fare to go from Heathrow to Zone 1 on the Elizabeth Line if you have a pre-loaded Zone 1-3 Travelcard?

 

[Watershed]

OK, I'm landing at Heathrow, Terminal 2, Plan to buy an Oystercard at the rail station there for £5, add another £5 for pay-as-you-go, then load a Zone 1-3 7-day Travelcard for £43.50 (or whatever the price will be)

Oyster will cap Monday-Sunday at the same rates as Travelcards, and with your journeys into Zone 4 which have been discussed on the previous thread, a combination of smaller caps and extension fares may actually work out cheaper. The Oyster system will automatically calculate the cheapest option.

So unless you will be visiting solely over a period which falls over multiple 'cap weeks' (e.g. Tuesday to the following Friday), I would just load a decent credit, say £40 to start with, and then take it from there.

Now I'm faced with three options:

1. Ride the old slow way to Central London on the Piccadilly Line ~55 minutes.
2. Ride the faster route on the new Elizabeth Line, ~29 minutes.
3. Ride the fastest way on the Heathrow Express, same route as the Elizabeth Line but without stopping, ~15 minutes.

Then there are the fares: Piccadilly cheapest, Elizabeth Line in the middle, Heathrow Express most expensive.

How to decide? Well, of course, it all depends on my priorities: What is more valuable to me, time or money? But the devil is in the details. I'd like to save time, of course, but not at huge extra expense. And I'd like to travel cheaply, but not if it takes forever. So...:

Those journeys times are purely from departing Heathrow to arriving at the other end. They don't take into account the fact the frequency - if you're unlucky enough to just miss a Heathrow Express service, you will save barely any time by waiting for the next one for instance.

The Piccadilly line runs every 5 minutes, so has the best frequency. If you are staying somewhere that isn't near Paddington, you also have to consider the change and additional journey time across from Paddington.

Another option is to take a bus to Hayes & Harlington and then the EL from there. This would take slightly longer than the direct EL option, but less time than the Piccadilly Line, at a price somewhere in between - a bus single fare is £1.65 (but it's included within all Travelcards and caps) and then £3.40 on the EL. The X140 takes 11-14 mins and runs every 15 mins. It's then 21-24 mins on the EL, which runs every 5-10 mins from Hayes & Harlington. So a total journey time of around 45 mins in total. If you are heading to somewhere near Paddington this may be a worthwhile option.

If you book in advance, Heathrow Express "Fixed Day Single" fares start from £5.50 and are valid on any HEx service on the date booked. However I gather you will be travelling soon, so the available fares may be rather more expensive than this.

But now I have a question. Since I will have a Zone 1-3 Travelcard, presumably I won't have to pay the full fare from Zone 6 (Heathrow) to Zone 1, but instead just Zone 6 to Zone 3, at which point my Travelcard will cover the rest of the journey. For situations such as this, one is charged "extension fares" (is that the right term?) out of your pay-as-you-go balance on your Oystercard. So my questions are:

What is the extension fare to go from Heathrow to Zone 1 on the Piccadilly Line if you have a pre-loaded Zone 1-3 Travelcard?
and
What is the extension fare to go from Heathrow to Zone 1 on the Elizabeth Line if you have a pre-loaded Zone 1-3 Travelcard?

Yes, they are termed extension fares. For travel within the numbered Zones, extension fares are quite simple to work out - they are simply the single fare for the zones not covered by the Travelcard, as per the single fare finder.

So on the Piccadilly line you will be charged £1.80 off-peak, as if you had travelled to Boston Manor.

Whereas on the EL you will be charged £6.50, as if you had travelled to Hanwell.

 

[MaidaVale]

I'll be honest my advice would be to avoid Heathrow Express unless you are in a particular rush or are on an expenses account, Especially now the onboard service has been reduced to the bare minimum, Personally I always use the Elizabeth Line into Paddington, as onward connections are pretty decent, Then again, I always opt for a contactless cap anyway, So don't have to deal with the single fares.

If you're looking to reduce costs, I'd go Picc or via the way stated by @Watershed via the X140 bus and Hayes & Harlington station, But by far the easiest way is to take the EL if you aren't worried too much about cost (I still wouldn't reccoment HEx even if you aren't on a tight budget)

 

[Haywain]

Even using the Elizabeth line will involve a change at Padd, so if you are staying further away you can probably add 10 to 25 minutes on to your journey time.

 

[pyxbiz]

Oyster will cap Monday-Sunday at the same rates as Travelcards, and with your journeys into Zone 4 which have been discussed on the previous thread, a combination of smaller caps and extension fares may actually work out cheaper. The Oyster system will automatically calculate the cheapest option.

So unless you will be visiting solely over a period which falls over multiple 'cap weeks' (e.g. Tuesday to the following Friday), I would just load a decent credit, say £40 to start with, and then take it from there.

Whenever I travel to London, I am zipping and zooping around town in a constant whirlwind, often taking 8, 10 or even 12 or more tube/rail journeys per DAY. It has always seemed to me that the "unlimited rides" aspect of the Travelcards is best for this situation — even if the daily "cap" would eventually mean that I'd pay the same without a Travelcard. Why? It has to do with feeling reassured and confident that I won't do something "wrong" or that some machine somewhere might accidentally overcharge me. I don't like having to either monitor my fare transactions constantly throughout the day, or just blithely trust (without monitoring) that the system is charging me correctly. With a Travelcard, all rides are already pre-paid for, no matter how many you take, and you can't possibly be subsequently overcharged unwittingly for some reason. Pay once, then forget about the whole topic of fares henceforth - I like that.

I mean, the Travelcards must serve some purpose, otherwise why would they even be offered as a fare option?

(There is never a situation where I take fewer rides per day than would put me up to the maximum cap level.)

Also, I do often travel from some oddball "off day" like a Tuesday to another random day like a much-later Thursday (flights are cheaper mid-week), so my visits never coincide with a "cap week."

 

[Watershed]

Whenever I travel to London, I am zipping and zooping around town in a constant whirlwind, often taking 8, 10 or even 12 or more tube/rail journeys per DAY. It has always seemed to me that the "unlimited rides" aspect of the Travelcards is best for this situation — even if the daily "cap" would eventually mean that I'd pay the same without a Travelcard. Why? It has to do with feeling reassured and confident that I won't do something "wrong" or that some machine somewhere might accidentally overcharge me. I don't like having to either monitor my fare transactions constantly throughout the day, or just blithely trust (without monitoring) that the system is charging me correctly. With a Travelcard, all rides are already pre-paid for, no matter how many you take, and you can't possibly be subsequently overcharged unwittingly for some reason. Pay once, then forget about the whole topic of fares henceforth - I like that.

I mean, the Travelcards must serve some purpose, otherwise why would they even be offered as a fare option?

(There is never a situation where I take fewer rides per day than would put me up to the maximum cap level.)

Also, I do often travel from some oddball "off day" like a Tuesday to another random day like a much-later Thursday (flights are cheaper mid-week), so my visits never coincide with a "cap week."

Fair enough - I guess this is probably one of the few scenarios where loading a Travelcard in advance makes sense. The only other one would be if you wanted to do a non-stop split in combination with some other ticket (e.g. a Zones 1-3 Travelcard + Boundary Zone 3-Oxford). Though in most cases there is only a small saving by doing so.

 

[pyxbiz]

So on the Piccadilly line you will be charged £1.80 off-peak, as if you had travelled to Boston Manor.

Whereas on the EL you will be charged £6.50, as if you had travelled to Hanwell.

Bingo, that's the answer! Thanks.

So, like you said (as I already knew), the frequency plays a big factor too -- I always calculate adding the maximum wait time when figuring these things out, because I assume that The Law of Irony will always predominate, with just barely missing a train no matter which option I choose. Thus, in practical reality,

Heathrow Express is 15 min wait + 15 min ride for 30 min total, for £25
Elizabeth Line is 15 min wait + 29 min ride for 44 min total, for £6.50 extension fare
Piccadilly Line is 5 min wait + ~46 min ride for ~51 min total, for £1.80 extension fare

Seen like this, Piccadilly Line seems to be the best option, on a price-vs-speed scale. You can save 7 minutes traveling time at a cost of £4.70 by taking the Elizabeth Line, or save 21 minutes at a cost of £23.20 for Heathrow Express.

Which is fine by me, as I've always traveled via the Piccadilly Line in the past, so I'm quite familiar with the journey!

Even using the Elizabeth line will involve a change at Padd, so if you are staying further away you can probably add 10 to 25 minutes on to your journey time.

Yes, that's another key detail -- one's eventual final destination also helps determine which option from Heathrow is best. Since I don't yet know where I'll be staying, I don't yet know whether it'll be easier to reach from Paddington or from some station on the Piccadilly Line. If I was staying right outside Paddington itself, then the Elizabeth Line woould be best. But if I was staying next to (for example) Holloway Road, then obviously a direct ride on the Piccadilly Line would actually save time.

 

[JonathanH]

I mean, the Travelcards must serve some purpose, otherwise why would they even be offered as a fare option?

They are the past though. London has embraced Oyster / Contactless in a big way because most people trust it to do the right thing.

The big prize for TfL is being able to remove ticket machines, no longer have to maintain the paper ticket machinery on the ticket gates, enhance revenue protection and obtain better data about travelling patterns.

 

[plugwash]

I mean, the Travelcards must serve some purpose, otherwise why would they even be offered as a fare option?

Well mainly because Travelcards have been around for a long time, weekly capping is relatively new.

However travelcards still have serveral advantages over capping.

1. They can start on any day. Weekly capping can only start on a Monday. This can make a difference if you for-example arrive sunday night and leave saturday morning.
2. With PAYG you are required to touch in and touch out on every journey, if a touch is missed or misinterpreted you risk a maximum fare or potentially worse if you run into revenue protection. With a travelcard you only have to touch in and out if your jouney takes you beyond the area of your travelcard's validity. This also means you can split ticket with a travelcard and a regular rail ticket.
3. Travelcards are available for longer periods, with the discount increasing the longer the period.
4. I'm not 100% sure on this, but my understanding is that weekly capping on Oyster is implemented retrospectively, so you have to have enough credit to cover the daily caps.

 

[MikeWh]

4. I'm not 100% sure on this, but my understanding is that weekly capping on Oyster is implemented retrospectively, so you have to have enough credit to cover the daily caps.

Correct.