Action for Public Transport (N.S.W.) Inc.

After five or more years of development, the designers of the so-called integrated ticketing system for Sydney’s public transport have still failed to have any meaningful consultation with that most important group of stakeholders, the travelling public, according to a transport consumer group.

Allan Miles, secretary of Action for Public Transport (APT), was commenting on yesterday’s announcement on the membership of a new integrated ticketing board. “It includes the heads of all the transport operators,” Mr Miles said, “and the company developing the ticket, but the people who will be expected to buy and use the ticket don’t get a look in.”

Mr Miles said that all transport users would welcome a true integrated ticketing system, but he doubted that the proposed smart-card, called the "TCard", would be of much benefit to passengers. “People will be inconvenienced by having to tag on when boarding a bus and then tag off when leaving. If they fail to do so, their card could be debited with a huge amount.”

“The Ministry of Transport in its submission last week to The Independent Pricing and Regulatory Tribunal (IPART) laid the foundation for a one-ticket system,” Mr Miles said. He also said that since 1st July this year, the whole of South East Queensland has had a one-ticket system – all without the use of smart cards.

(See http://www.translink.com.au)

“In all the time that the smart card has been under development in Sydney,” Mr Miles said, “no true consultation had been held with passengers.” He said that there had been briefings to user groups, where the team said what they might and might not do, and where they fielded questions from future users, but no co-operative consultation.

“That most convenient ticket of all, the TravelPass, will disappear altogether,” said Mr Miles. “Each journey on each bus, train or ferry will be charged separately,” he said, “and there has been no statement about what discounts frequent users will get.”

Mr Miles said that, at least with the pre-purchased TravelPasses, Ferry Tens, TravelTens and rail weeklies, passengers know up front how much they are paying. “With the stored-value electronic Tcard,” Mr Miles said, “they might be deducting any amount from your credit.”

Mr Miles called on the Transport Minister to establish a true consultative process with passengers before the system development goes any further. “Commuters don’t just want to know what they are getting,” Mr Miles said, “commuters want a say in what they are getting.”

Contact: Allan Miles. 9516-1906.

Allan Miles 
Action for Public Transport (NSW) 
PO Box K606 
Haymarket NSW 1240 
http://www.aptnsw.org.au 
Ph (02) 9516 1906