please empty your brain below
The irony is that for the Working for home mob, these fare increases are not exactly make you go rush back to the office and spend that money in city centers.

Bruce Wayne | 15.02.22 - 8:07 a.m. | #

Some events at the Excel have subsidised the Dangleway fare for registered attendees.

I don't have any evidence of this continuing post covid, though; will need a big multi hall commercial conference to test this.

MilesT | 15.02.22 - 8:30 a.m. | #

Given that these are non-cash prices, there really is no need for all fares to end in either 0 or 5, and some of the increases (such as the bus single fare) could have been adjusted more closely to the rate of inflation.

Man of Kent | 15.02.22 - 8:59 a.m. | #

Of course many benefit from free or discounted travel, Londoners are better blessed than most of the country in this respect.

The @28,000 employees of TfL enjoy free travel on the TfL network.....along with nominated partner/family member (flatmate?). A valuable peak.

Employers are also eligible of a 75% National Rail Season Ticket discount, with free loan.

Rod | 15.02.22 - 9:00 a.m. | #

Apparently Bike users can travel free M-F on Dangleway before 09:30. I will have to check out as I can't se this elswhere.

Al W | 15.02.22 - 9:13 a.m. | #

It is somewhat sad to see the Mayor being vilified in some quarters for these fare increases when most commercial train operators were effectively paid to keep services running. Whatever your political leaning, it seems weird to decouple how national rail operators and TfL are being treated.

Matt | 15.02.22 - 9:27 a.m. | #

Matt - not just national rail operators. Metro systems like Manchester's Metrolink, and the Tyne and Wear Metro have also had bailouts without the trauma TfL's getting. Hard to conclude anything other than that it's political.

That said, there's likely to be massive cuts nationwide on National Rail and on the buses as they had to spend a lot on keeping the show on the road during Covid and the Treasury isn't keen on giving any more money. Squeezes and fare rises will become an increasingly national issue. And it will increasingly "drive" people to their cars.

Andrew Bowden | Homepage | 15.02.22 - 9:47 a.m. | #

A necessary evil unfortunately. Prices are going up everywhere and energy costs are having a knock-on effect too.

Thanks for the 2012-2022 blue/red summaries at the end of each paragraph. It really helps put the increase rates into perspective.

Cornish Cockney | 15.02.22 - 10:06 a.m. | #

Please accept this as my usual ‘my heart bleeds’ comment from my homeland in the shires... where a sub £2 bus fare for even a couple of stops is but a wild dream.

dg writes: That’s the comment in today’s sealed envelope ✉ and I am celebrating with the customary Creme Egg.

Lew | 15.02.22 - 10:12 a.m. | #

Another cost for Dangleway users is that a PAYG cablecard ride doesn't count towards your weekly cap. That cheaper Thames Clipper ride is also uncapped.

ap | 15.02.22 - 10:22 a.m. | #

It’s hardly likely in the present climate, but I assume that if eg some leisure park developer made the mayor an acceptable offer to remove and reuse the Dangleway elsewhere, he’d bite their arm off.

Philip | 15.02.22 - 10:37 a.m. | #

Lew - I'm guessing you have the option of driving instead to avoid high fares. If we all did that in London the city would almost literally grind to a halt; we rely on public transport in a way the shires don't.

Andrew S | 15.02.22 - 10:41 a.m. | #

"for the Working for home mob, these fare increases are not exactly make you go rush back to the office."

As part of the 'working from home mob' you're right. My company wants us in 1 or 2 days a week. I live just outside the Oyster area (by one stop! grrr) so have to buy a train/travel card ticket. That's £26 a day. Given that this mobster working at home will not be rushing back in. The flexi season tickets saved you a few pounds over the cost of daily tickets, which adds up over a year but the 8 tickets have to be used within 28 days and given a rough split of 1 or 2 days a week I wasn't using them all up so they were working our more expensive.

I realise I am incredibly lucky to have the good fortune to be able to work from home, but at the same time I don't like to see parts of London so empty. It's all the small businesses that have now lost my incidental expenditure (the sandwich bars, cafes, newsagents and the like) I feel most sorry for but if I can avoid spending £52 a week to get a train I will!

The work from home mob | 15.02.22 - 11:00 a.m. | #

Al W - This page says that you can take a non-folded bike anytime on the dangleway

John | 15.02.22 - 11:02 a.m. | #

Of course this fare increase is political. Tory governments have a long and despicable track-record of passing off their dirty work to local government (eg forcing increases in council tax by starving councils of central funds) so that they don’t get the blame, and the current regime is especially hostile to Sadiq Khan. Zac Goldsmith’s campaign against him was widely seen as racist and last week Patel condemned his sacking of Cressida Dick as “politicising” the police, even though Johnson did exactly the same to Ian Blair when Mayor himself. HMG has handed out billions to privatised rail companies in the pandemic but consistently tightened the financial screws on publicly-funded TfL as a means of undermining Khan, because the last thing No 10 wants is a Labour capital city on its doorstep. Thatcher abolished the GLC because she saw it as a constant reminder of her failures on housing and employment; now the government is using financial muscle to try and discredit the current Mayor by making him take the blame for Treasury policies.

Labourer | 15.02.22 - 11:44 a.m. | #

In November I bought a 'multi-journey boarding pass' for the cable car, ten journeys for £17, valid for a year - which is a huge saving. It's not very well advertised (I wonder why), and it had a bit of an 'under the counter' feel when I asked for it :)

I wonder by how much that will go up, assuming they'll keep it going? If it goes up in line with the standard tickets, it's still a good saving.

It's a bit of faffing as it doesn't work on the gates and has to be punched by a member of staff on the way in, then waved at one on the other side to let you out, but when it's only costing £1.70 for a ride, it's a minor inconvenience

John | 15.02.22 - 12:22 p.m. | #

When Labour set up the GLA in 2000, its arguable whether or not they looked at the Livingstone/Thatcher era and deliberately decided not to give it so much power that it became a rival power base.

So here we are again with the Conservatives running one thing and Labour running another, and it'll probably not end well - again.

Still Anon | 15.02.22 - 12:39 p.m. | #

The 10-trip cablecar pass isn't changing.

"The carnet ticket price will stay the same so that it remains equal to £1.70 per journey, which will continue to support local and regular users of the service."

It is
a) ridiculously good value
b) entirely unadvertised, both online and at the terminals

diamond geezer | Homepage | 15.02.22 - 12:44 p.m. | #

I've just checked the Freedom Pass fare for the Dangleway on the London Councils' website. They do mention that the carnet ticket may be a cheaper alternative. The carnet price works out less than half per single journey than the £4 reduced fare. Is the carnet ticket transferable, e.g. can both myself and my wife (or indeed anyone else) use it provided we are not travelling at the same time?

JohnC | 15.02.22 - 1:28 p.m. | #

For all the moans, London fares are still very cheap compared with elsewhere, especially bus fares. If Khan had not frozen things, we would be at about these levels now without the larger rises of this year.

mr Jif | 15.02.22 - 2:26 p.m. | #

AndrewS - a lot of us outside of London don't have the option of driving either, whether it is due to being unable to afford it, not being able to drive for health reasons or not having a place to park. I live in a city which is already struggling to cope with the sheer volume of cars and facing another round of cuts to buses (following bus cuts at the beginning of 2022) including the possible removal of all park and rides.

A regulated bus system in every town and city like in London would be a great idea, and we should all be pressing for such a system. Even those who don't use the buses would benefit with less congestion and pollution due to a cheaper and more frequent, and therefore more popular, bus service.

Richard | 15.02.22 - 2:46 p.m. | #

Londoners also fund TfL through council tax. On the whole Londoners pay much less council tax than non-Londoners and get much more in return (that's before we look at ease of access to centrally government funded cultural activities). A 100% hike in the TfL council tax precept still wouldn't lift council tax to non-London levels.

Jon | 15.02.22 - 4:38 p.m. | #

…if the g̶o̶v̶e̶r̶n̶m̶e̶n̶t̶ taxpayer won’t help foot the bill then you and I are going to have to

MS | 15.02.22 - 4:50 p.m. | #

The Dangleway's carnet is just a cardboard ticket with no identifying marks other than a serial number, so you should be able to share it. It does say 'not transferable' on it but I don't know how they could enforce that. And as it's a fixed number of trips, I don't know why they'd even bother.

John | 15.02.22 - 4:56 p.m. | #

I suspect that the cost of dismantling the danglway from its current position and re-erecting it at Alton Towers or wherever would be no less than putting a brand new one up in wherever. Not a bargain.

Malcolm of Kent | 15.02.22 - 6:21 p.m. | #

The last season ticket I bought was back in 2012, incidentally a Z1-3. I'm astounded that it would now set me back another £450.

What makes me particularly grumpy is that the cost of fuel is relatively unchanged over the same period - according to the RAC, petrol was 135p/litre in mid-2012 and is now 148p. If it grew at the same rate as the Z1-3 season ticket it would be closer to 180p.

Sadly, government policy prioritises the "hard working motorist" over the hard working train commuter

Rob | 15.02.22 - 6:51 p.m. | #

Another person surprised at how cheap London busses are (even now) - I'm commenting from central Manchester. I cycle or use the tram (Metrolink) which is better value - because the busses here are a rip off.

mark addy | 15.02.22 - 7:10 p.m. | #

I want to watch my agenda-driven TV - and I want you to subsidise it.

I want cheap travel — and I want you to subsidise it.

My heart bleeds.

Tintinhaddock | 15.02.22 - 8:18 p.m. | #

I'm eating a lot of Creme Eggs today.

diamond geezer | Homepage | 15.02.22 - 8:29 p.m. | #

The government's response the 'pandemic' resulted in all this, and globalist Khan would have caused even more damage to transport in London if he'd had his way [and still wants to]

felix | 15.02.22 - 9:23 p.m. | #

There are numerous historical examples of various kinds of cableway being relocated. I suspect the dangleway towers aren't economically reusable (typically new towers are cheap). Begs the question of whether the demolition costs will be a budgetary sting in the tail for TfL in a couple of decades..the gift that keeps giving.

MilesT | 16.02.22 - 8:31 a.m. | #

Indeed one wonders how much longer London Transport could have survived without having to ask for money from the government had Mr Khan not brought in his fares freeze. I can't remember where I saw it, but I do seem to remember a financial report published by TfL around 2018/9 about the impact the fares freeze has been having on their finances, saying that although their fare revenue is nominally increasing (due to more people travelling), in real terms it has been decreasing since the implementation of the fares freeze.

Considering how long they were able to survive during the first pandemic, could they perhaps have been able to wait it out a bit longer? Perhaps even until April 2021, when restrictions were eased

AndrewP | 16.02.22 - 10:15 a.m. | #

When he was Mayor, Broris Johnson did a despicable deal with George Osborne that scrapped government funding for TfL, leaving London almost the only European capital without central government support for its public transport. TfL therefore relies almost entirely on fares and commercial revenue, so when the pandemic struck, its income plunged by around 90% — nothing to do with a fares freeze or Johnson’s lie that Khan had bankrupted TfL. Cuts to buses and Freedom Pass availability, plus fare rises, are now being imposed by the Treasury as their price for helping keep the system running.

The government claims commitment to “net zero” and phasing out of petrol/diesel vehicles, but over the last 11 years has consistently kept petrol duty the same while increasing rail fares annually by much more than inflation, because public transport users are an easier (and often poorer) target than car drivers. Keeping bus, tube and rail fares down is not a selfish “I want cheap travel” aim, but a vital way of helping reduce private car travel and incentivising use of public transport across London and the UK, for the benefit of everyone.

Labourer | 16.02.22 - 11:10 a.m. | #

Newham took away my Disabled Persons Freedompass saying I wasnt deaf enough. I am waiting on the LGO to take them up their decision on legal grounds. Its take a year to get to this stage & now I have a 60+ Oystercard which is OK for travel after 9 AM but I miss my Freedompass which wasnt time restricted & valid on buses outside London

Andrew Jarman | 04.03.22 - 10:12 p.m. | #











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