Re: [Melb] $3.30 tickets almost useless

["Steven Hurst" <hurste@primus.com.au>]

Is the ticket a metcard???  Or is it just a plain old ticket?

- I agree, it sounds stupid!!!


Peter Parker <parkerp@alphalink.com.au> wrote in message
37e8868b@news.alphalink.com.au">news:37e8868b@news.alphalink.com.au...
> The much vaunted $3.30 off-peak tickets offered to
> train travellers appear to be almost useless for most
> off-peak commuters.
>
> I rang Caulfield Station and found out the following:
>
> 1. The tickets are only for train travel - there are no
> transfers to trams or buses.
>
> 2. The availability of the tickets is extremely poor. The
> only place they can be obtained is Premium stations. Metcard
> vending machines or Metcard outlets do not stock them.  Most
> people would need to travel to a Premium station to buy one.
> If they pay a fare for this trip they lose much of the savings
> this ticket confers; if they don't they risk fines for
> fare dodging.
>
> 3. It gets even worse.  You MUST know the day
> that you intend to travel at the time of ticket PURCHASE, not
> at the time of ticket USE, as with a Metcard.  This is OK for people
> who have regular off-peak travel patterns (eg work), but much off-peak
> travel is discretionary, and may be made on the spur of the moment.
> If you do not travel on the day that the ticket is valid for, no
> refunds will be payable.
>
> Lower fares to encourage off-peak travel is a good idea, but the
> implementation is very poor.  The above three problems identified
> above are so severe that the $3.30 ticket will be a poor choice
> for the very types of off-peak travel that the ticket is supposed to
> encourage.
>
>
> Peter Parker