The Champion ● Wednesday 16 May 2018
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Confusing train fares are driving me off the rails I'M coming off the rails - or in fact thousands of others are! According to an article in a prominent railway magazine I've been reading, following years of growth in passenger numbers since privatisation, passenger figures for 2017 were 1.73 billion - 19 million fewer than 2016. If these figures don't worry the train operators, they jolly well should do. Now this article, by a respected rail expert, largely blames this 1.1% slump on the sale of season tickets, I think rightly, on changing working practices, with the traditional five-day working week becoming less common and many folk no longer work a strict 9am-5pm, meaning that buying off-peak tickets works out cheaper. You can of course add to that the increasing number of people working from home using their computers.
And I imagine he is quite right, and maybe the railway companies seriously should consider more flexible 'seasons' for any three or four days out of the traditional five perhaps. But it also seems to me that they should also be thinking in terms of the long-distance and leisure market. When I was a regular train traveller, sometimes covering many hundreds of miles in a week, train travel was simpler - very much simpler - than it is now. For instance, if I wished to travel from Liverpool to Norwich (which I did several times a year), I could buy a full return or, with time restrictions, a ‘saver.’ With either of these options you could choose ‘Via London’ or ‘Not Valid Via London.’ It cost the same either way
Walking netball group seeks new members A HIGHLIGHT of the recent Commonwealth Games was the English netball team winning an unexpected Gold Medal, bringing much excitement to those people who love the sport. Less well known is that the Maghull and Lydiate U3A have a ‘walking netball’ group which may be of interest to people who prefer walking to more energetic running and jumping! The group is on the look-out for new members. If you are interested, contact the U3A at www.maghullandlydiateu3a.org.uk.
WAYFARERS SHOPPING ARCADE
BRIDAL EXHIBITION
and in fact the savvy individual would choose ‘Via London’ because in fact this ticket was valid either as the name implies for travel changing in the capital (and the underground journey was free too) or on the so-called ‘direct’ service. Incidentally, believe it or not, there is still a train from Lime Street to Norwich every hour. It is a Magical Mystery Tour of the Peak District and the Fens and takes as long as the ‘via’ - but it is accomplished on one train and the scenery is beautiful. I always bought a ‘via’ ticket though I only occasionally actually travelled via London. You can of course still travel by either route - but you must specify exactly the
much more for your journey than you counted on. Most rail insiders agree that a complete review of the ticketing system is needed and I do not claim to be the oracle that can save our railways. I would be far more happy being able simply to go down to any station and just ask for a ticket to wherever, and be given perhaps three choices only as to what sort of ticket I wanted. Of course there would be winners and losers in this game - but at least you would know what you were paying for and wouldn't have to be a computer genius hopefully to bag the best bargain. Apart from anything else, how galling it must be if you have just spent, say, £100 on a ticket and found the clever s** sitting beside you had paid £25 for the same thing.
route you wish to take and stick to it. And this is where things come unstuck. On the ‘direct’ train you can still buy a full ‘open’ return, usable at any time of the day, there or back. Or you can buy ‘advance’ single tickets which can work out far cheaper - but you MUST travel on a particular timed train and your ticket is not valid on the services of other train operators in the event of breakdowns or other calamities. So yes, you can now get to Norwich and back more cheaply than ever - but there are serious ‘buts’ and if you play with your computer for long enough you can quite possibly find it cheaper still if you bought two or three different tickets covering places en-route. Probably they too would have their own time/day restrictions and woe betide you if you accidentally break them - you could end up paying much,
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