Auckland train fare prices to rise from today

Or at least that's what we were told. I figured I'd buy a few 10 trip tickets a week ago before the price went up, to no avail, as they'd sold out. Back then I thought 'No matter, plenty of time before the increase' and went back on Friday to pick some up. This time, they had tickets, however they refused to sell them to me because 'the prices rise on Sunday'. So really, the prices rose a long time ago. Excellent. Yes, I could possibly have gone to another vendor, however there aren't any others near me (which is another point of frustration), and I figured some of them might be pulling the same stunts.

I really feel that these price increases are stupid in terms of their timing. We're in a time when they want to encourage more people to take public transport to try and reduce the congestion on the roads, and this is how they do it? By punishing people who put up with these trains by raising prices. I read a few remarks from some people saying that the increased costs were making them consider going back to using a car, as it was cheaper! Sure, it costs money to improve the lines and buy new trains etc, but putting the cost onto people who are trying to help by taking the train isn't the way to go.

I also still don't feel like the monthly pass is enough value to use. The full 'all zones' pass is currently listed at $160/month (however I remember that being the old price, did they possibly not raise that?). At $160 a month, it costs the same as roughly 31 trips would cost when purchasing 10 ride concessions. So basically 31 trips or 15-16 days of 2 way train travel are needed per month in order for me to get my moneys worth when using the monthly, if I dip under that then I'd have been better off buying 10 ride concessions. First off, I don't catch the train in the weekend (quite simply because the weekend timetable is completely useless), so that removes all the weekends from the equation. Next, there are usually a couple of days a month where I end up driving for various reasons, so scratch a few trips from the monthly quota there. Finally, any month with holidays in it is going to remove trips - December/January would be incredibly stupid months to buy monthly passes for, and other months are going to vary depending on how many holidays they contain. Finally, unplanned variables such as being sick mean that theres the possibility of dropping another few trips throughout the year (I'm not going to mention the instances when the conductor simply forgets to collect fares from some people, but that does happen on occasion). All in all, it doesn't seem like good enough value to me, simply because the possibility exists for the monthly pass to cost you more than buying 10 trip concession tickets - and this is for someone who would be classed as a heavy/regular user of the train system.

Tags: NZ, NZ Trains

 Print | Posted on Sunday, January 14, 2007 1:01 PM | Filed Under [ NZ NZ Trains ]