Comment by iamcalledrob
16 hours ago
Incidentally, London has a "Freedom Pass" (free transport for retirees), which is funded in the way you describe.
Instead of TfL being forced to take the loss, they are reimbursed by local government cost of the transport.
As an aside, I also take some issue with this pass being completely free to use. In my experience, people end up using it to go a single stop just because it's free, so why not -- which slows bus service for everyone else. I think it should be 20p per journey or something like that.
But for many old people walking that one stop is difficult. So this charge would partially defeat the object of the pass.
Taking such a fee also has transaction costs, in the time if nothing else.
To liken this back to the old days - the difference in time between flashing a valid transfer slip (of paper) and having to drop change into the automated till.
Nowadays, both are “scan your card at entry and exit”, aren’t they?
Elderly will have to do that, too, because a) I expect they still want to track usage, and b) allowing some passengers to hop on a bus without checking in makes it too easy for those ineligible to do that (e.g. elderly who do not live in London) to try and do that, too.
Elderly in all of England have the equivalent of a Freedom Pass but just for busses (Freedom Passes include almost all Tfl transport, e.g. underground, trams, DLR and some Nationbal Rail inside London)
Unfortunately the bus passes and freedom passes are not interchangeable and sometimes have to be manually checked if not in the local region,
London buses are tap on entry only. For pay as you go riders the fare is not linked to distance travelled.