Today the Mayor of London announced the fares levels that will apply to TfL services and National Rail services within the zonal area from 2nd January 2013.
Full details of TfL fare and season ticket prices are in the Mayoral Decision document, but a summary can be found below. Fares to and from Watford Junction are determined by London Midland and have not yet been disclosed.
Fares will increase, on average, by 4.2% which is equivalent to the RPI value for July 2012 + 1%. This is lower than envisaged in the TfL business plan, which assumed increases each year of RPI+2%. Courtesy of a change in government policy, which has reduced the level of National Rail fares increase from RPI+3% to RPI+1%, TfL has received £96m to lower the rate of increase in 2013. It is understood the RPI+1% assumption will apply for 2014 and 2015 in line with the revised Government policy for National Rail fare increases. All told, this the total additional revenue yield from this increase is expected to be £134m.
The headline aspects of the TfL increases are:-
The PAYG Bus and Tram Fare will increase by 5p to £1.40. In addition, the cash bus fare rises by 10p to £2.40. The Daily Bus and Tram Cap increases to £4.40.
The PAYG fares for the TfL tariff, which applies to Tube, DLR, Overground and certain National Rail routes, typically rise by 10p or 20p. Similar levels of increase apply to the National Rail PAYG tariff. Through Tube and Train tickets into Zone 1 increase by 20p or 30p.
Within Zone 1, the Tube fare increases by 10p to £2.10. Whilst the Zone 1 to Zone 6 peak return fare will increase to £10 (£5 each way).
One Day Travelcard prices will also increase by 30p-80p, although these increases only apply to paper tickets. The Daily Cap values for Oyster card users remain at 2012 levels. We therefore have a return to differential prices for One Day Travelcards compared to Daily Caps, although this time it is to reflect the higher cost of issuing paper tickets and the increased levels of fraud with such tickets. It does not reflect a difference in the coverage or availability of the capped product compared to the paper One Day Travelcard product.
Weekly Travelcard prices increase by around £1-£3.20 per week, and the new rates can be seen in the image below. For those wondering what this means for longer season tickets, a bit of arithmetic can provide the answer – as before monthly tickets are 3.84 times whatever the relevant weekly rate is and annual tickets are 40 times.
The 2013 Fares Table
Extending Oyster
In addition to the fares announcement a separate TfL press release confirms, after a long period of silence, that PAYG is to be extended outside Greater London to Shenfield and Broxbourne. This delivers the Greater Anglia franchise commitment. The following stations will be equipped with Oyster readers and added to the PAYG scheme – Brentwood, Shenfield, Waltham Cross, Theobalds Grove, Cheshunt and Broxbourne. It should be noted, however, that this scope is slightly less than was announced when Abellio won the Greater Anglia franchise. The plan at that time envisaged the scheme reaching as far as Hertford East on the West Anglia line, something that remains a point of contention between TfL and the DfT. The PAYG fare values for these new locations have not yet been disclosed.
Rethinking The Cycle Scheme
Alongside the Fares announcement, the Mayor has also said that access charges for the Cycle Hire scheme will also increase – indeed some charges will double. The annual access charge, for example, increases from the current £45 to £90. These are the first increases in charges on the Cycle Hire scheme since it was introduced, and TfL have stated the increased revenue is needed to support further improvements in the scheme. In this regard, it should be noted that the scope of the Cycle Hire scheme expanded this year beyond the original Central London area to cover Tower Hamlets and parts of Hackney, and Kensington and Chelsea to reach Westfield at Shepherds Bush. Further expansion to parts of South West London is underway now with introduction planned for 2013.
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