Re: XPT Whinge,(cont)

[David Langley <del@ancc.com.au>]

Matthew Geier wrote:

> In article <913208531.803084@woody>,
> Michael Walker <walker@hotkey.net.au> wrote:
> >
> >On the other hand we have the passengers. There are two types - those who
> >pay full fare and those who get concession or free ride due to theri social
> >status or because they have travel vouchers or are employees. The latter are
> >a captive market who will ride the train whether it is the best service in
> >the world or the worst.
>
>  This is actually a more serious problem for them than it first appears,
> even if CountryLink were totaly re-imbursed at an appropiate level for the
> concession fares - the fact of life is that the concession travellers, due
> to the way the concession system operates, are distorting the loading figures.
>
>  If those concession travellers could get cheap/free airline seats, would they
> travel by train ?. Probably not. A good number of them would probably swap
> to road coach services as well, if the concession system was consistant
> across modes.
>
>

I suppose that concession fare travel is only on the rail because it is a govt
policy to permit this travel for those eligible but the govt has no power to force
the private operators to permit this sort of travel to the extent that rail does,
rail after all is owned by the govt.