London tube Ticket (OT)

Local services only. The pensioners' privilege doesn't apply to National Express or the long distance Megabus network, but NatEx have a discount card which can be bought by people over a certain age.

You can use local buses to travel that far, but you'd be town hopping from Carlisle to Penrith to Lancaster to.... (You get the idea). I know of someone who did Birmingham to Norwich for free, but it took him two days each way.

In message , at

If it's a bus, yes. Seems rather a long bus route though, sure it's not a Natex Coach service?

But you could probably patch together some other bus routes, some of which can be quite long (eg Manchester-Derby). Start looking for Newcastle-Durham, then Durham-Stockton (and so on).

And any time of day here in SE London. That has changed fairly recently because of the number of twearlies swarming at the bus stops around

In message , Roland Perry writes

Not usable on any service where stops are on average over 14km apart - speaking from memory so details may be slightly out.

LAs are free to offer additional concessions over and above the statutory minimum. Generally the most generous are in the metropolitan areas notably London as they are the only ones who get enough money from central government to afford it.

In message , at 11:42:14 on Thu, 17 Jan

And the trips I mentioned, would they qualify inside the scheme?

In message , Roland Perry writes

Not knowing how fart apart the stops are I cannot answer that. Suggest you ask the bus operator(s).

Changed many years ago in London.

Personally, I avoid using my pass in the rush hour at either end of the day. Seems fairer to me on others.

I'd love to know the *actual* cost of the service. Pensioners using buses etc outside rush hour is actually going to cost very little. Unless you assume they'd otherwise be paying the full fare for that journey. In my case I'd possibly go by car if I had to pay the fare.

In message , at 14:07:28 on Thu, 17 Jan

It costs the local authorities a lot, often more than they get as a grant from government for the project. As for the bus companies, there are reports that the demand does sometimes result in having to run more buses - so it's not always just soaking up un-used capacity.

In message , at 12:25:38 on Thu, 17 Jan

The latter two are sufficiently short trips it's plain they will have more stops than necessary.

The Trans-peak service has 37 stops listed, plus "every" stop in the Buxton area. As it's about 95km, even without that central section it's better than one stop every 3km.

Whilst there are definitely stories of that happening in (semi)rural areas

I doubt that it's noticeable in London

tim

You snipped my qualifications to my question.

So all the reports of buses running around near empty outside rush hour ain't true?

The trouble is it's all too easy to base the cost on the number of passenger journeys those with passes make. Finding out the actual costs if they didn't have free travel ain't so easy.

Rather like the NHS. Would every visit to a doctor still happen if they had to be paid for directly? I suspect the waiting rooms would be half empty.

Or any other city which runs a reasonable bus service. I can well imagine those where they are one an hour or less being more busy, though.

In message , at 15:33:40 on Thu, 17 Jan

That "cost" is what the LAs have to pay to the bus companies. (Except possibly in London, where the LA runs the buses, and is already paying all the costs in return for getting all the fares).

Cost to whom?

I was interested in the *actual* cost - not some statistic plucked from the air.

Unless you think the LA pays for every bus ticket individually.

They do. Round here, it was about 50p per ride last Summer, billed monthly, due to reduce by about a third real soon now, if it hasn't already. Companies are close-mouthed about how many they carry for commercial reasons.

It's effect is very variable.

Bus companies are refunded on the basis of a fixed percentage of the "commercial" fare.

There's no attempt to work out actual costs.

The theory is that that are paid (say) half the fare but are getting twice the number of (OAP) passengers for no increase in costs.

Of course that doesn't work if the number of passengers is so large that there is an increase in costs (because they have to increase the frequency).

OTOH, they may get more than twice the number of extra passengers and still run the same service as before.

Unfortunately it would mostly be the people who are really ill who wouldn't be there

tim