Make rail travel free

[yorksrob]

Ultimately, it would be better to subsidise public transport for journeys to one’s nearest local town, rather than a better town further away.

Not really. There are many reasons an individual might need to travel over various distances. The railway is uniquely positioned to facilitate that across the Nation.

 

[MML]

It really can't be free.

It can be free at the point of use, and paid for by the taxpayer, but then we need to know how much each taxpayer would be spending extra each year to fund it, bearing in mind they already partially subsidise the railways.

Some taxpayers will be paying extra for a service they rarely if ever use, although you could have a similar argument for taxpayers who don't drive or use public transport.

But nothing in life is free. Someone has to pay. It's just a question of people trying to avoid paying themselves and burdening someone else.

 

[Meerkat]

The reason claimed by the Hong Kong Government to provide subsidised travel to the elderly was precisely to encourage them to travel more. This provides social benefit because it improves the wellbeing of people. The only exceptions are premium services and border services.

It's also the same in London as well. Freedom Passes provide free travel to all modes of transport except premium services.

I can't see why elsewhere should be different to London or Hong Kong. Rail is an integral part of public transport. If they are treated like premium services by denying subsidies, the result is increased class divide because it means that the poor is denied access to an integral part of public transport.

Therefore the £2 bus cap should also be extended to cover all local rail services (with the majority of their journey running in a single metropolitan area) in my opinion. A classification scheme is needed to categorise rail services into long distance or local, where the former is excluded.

That’s for the elderly and in a local area, and off peak in London’s case.
How are you planning to fund the infrastructure to make sure present commuters can still get to work when the cheap tickets fill the trains with day trippers?

 

[Falcon1200]

It can be free at the point of use, and paid for by the taxpayer, but then we need to know how much each taxpayer would be spending extra each year to fund it, bearing in mind they already partially subsidise the railways.

And that for me is the essential point; What Government is going to raise taxes, or divert funds from other areas, in order to provide free rail travel? Any extra money is going to go towards the NHS, education or defence, to name just three, long before the railway gets it.

 

[mangyiscute]

The reason claimed by the Hong Kong Government to provide subsidised travel to the elderly was precisely to encourage them to travel more. This provides social benefit because it improves the wellbeing of people. The only exceptions are premium services and border services.

It's also the same in London as well. Freedom Passes provide free travel to all modes of transport except premium services.

I can't see why elsewhere should be different to London or Hong Kong. Rail is an integral part of public transport. If they are treated like premium services by denying subsidies, the result is increased class divide because it means that the poor is denied access to an integral part of public transport.

Therefore the £2 bus cap should also be extended to cover all local rail services (with the majority of their journey running in a single metropolitan area) in my opinion. A classification scheme is needed to categorise rail services into long distance or local, where the former is excluded.

Although as has been mentioned plenty of times, there are many local journeys that are only served by intercity trains, first one that pops into my head is something like Durham to Newcastle. Do you then handle a service as though it is local for passengers travelling to Durham, but intercity for passengers travelling further? That system would lead to a lot of fare evasion imo.

 

[yorksrob]

As the buses have shown, transport doesn't have to be free. It just has to be competitively priced to attract those of us below the median income (and that doesn't mean putting onerous restrictions on when people can travel, particularly for non-inter city journeys).

Unfortunately Government policy is driving the railway in the opposite direction.

 

[Mcr Warrior]

Although as has been mentioned plenty of times, there are many local journeys that are only served by intercity trains, first one that pops into my head is something like Durham to Newcastle.

Not quite the case on that particular flow, as there's a handful of Northern stoppers in the morning.

 

[AHCT]

I think the most important question here should be "how best can we make public transport (including rail) accessible for occasional travellers" - i.e. complicated travelcard/season ticket/fare zone/fare band distinctions can be made simpler, and especially for shorter journeys, how to obviate, as far as possible, travel "obstacles" and complications (like long queues to buy a ticket/needing to have the right app for the more technology savvy travellers/needing to walk around with 5 different travel passes).

London in that respect seems to be doing a better job than many other places - in Paris for instance there is no means of paying for an "all-zones" train, bus, metro and tram on a pay-as-you-go basis from any place on the network to another. Whilst the Paris travel card prices beat London's by a large margin, it still doesn't make travelling easier, and, I think, may be a bigger obstacle than prices themselves.

 

[Bertie the bus]

As the buses have shown, transport doesn't have to be free. It just has to be competitively priced to attract those of us below the median income (and that doesn't mean putting onerous restrictions on when people can travel, particularly for non-inter city journeys).

Unfortunately Government policy is driving the railway in the opposite direction.

Have buses shown that? The £2 fare was introduced in January last year. The (still updated) government Covid-19 transport usage spreadsheet shows bus use outside London for the last week in Nov 22 and Nov 23 to be:

2022 (Mon - Fri) - 91%, 93%, 87%, 91% and 89% of pre Covid levels.
2023 (Mon - Fri) - 88%, 97%, 89%, 90% and 88% of pre Covid levels.

Those figures look pretty similar to me.

 

[yorksrob]

Have buses shown that? The £2 fare was introduced in January last year. The (still updated) government Covid-19 transport usage spreadsheet shows bus use outside London for the last week in Nov 22 and Nov 23 to be:

2022 (Mon - Fri) - 91%, 93%, 87%, 91% and 89% of pre Covid levels.
2023 (Mon - Fri) - 88%, 97%, 89%, 90% and 88% of pre Covid levels.

Those figures look pretty similar to me.

Hmm. Perhaps something like a national railcard would be better for rail than a flat rate cut.