furnessvale
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Presumably the equivalent rail ticket would be some sort of day return rather than a full open period return?
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When buying a car costs less than your train journey....
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GWR don't offer 2 hour or day of departure advances, flexible full anytime or off peak fare for on the day purchases online, TVM or booking office.
Paddington > Bristol Parkway and rtn with a zone 1 - 6 travel card is £158.10 assuming travel from London before 9am and returning from Bristol after 10:30am. There is interestingly no evening peak on services from Bristol to London so £34 super off peak is the cheapest valid fare, departing Bristol on the return leg between 9am and 10:30am a "normal" off peak would be needed for £49.
The anytime return fare is only the cheapest flexible fare if departing London before 7:30am as after that you don't arrive at Bristol early enough to catch a peak time service back.
GWR will only sell an Anytime Return valid for a month, but anyone who uses an accredited ticket splitting website can book a flexible day return for around £100 less than the fare GWR would suggest, which may include a mixture of day returns and anytime/off peak singles.
£98??? Is it made from gold?
squizzler
Established Member
Ticket price myth busted by Loco2. They make these infographics from time to time by interrogating the data for ticket sales they have built up, and it shows UK prices are comparable if you plan ahead (and can pick the right day)!
This would be handy to show those who don't realise quite how wide the variation in ticket price can be, and might include quite a few rail supporters as well as detractors. As a case in point I had not realised, till I say the graph on here, how linear the rise in price was as the time ticked past; I had assumed in the UK there were only a few price points with quite wide bands of time during which fares were valid.
This would be handy to show those who don't realise quite how wide the variation in ticket price can be, and might include quite a few rail supporters as well as detractors. As a case in point I had not realised, till I say the graph on here, how linear the rise in price was as the time ticked past; I had assumed in the UK there were only a few price points with quite wide bands of time during which fares were valid.
Everyone knows that if you book ahead British fares can be cheap. That's not news. The debate is always about same day fares. The fairest comparison between countries would be for season tickets. That would be far more interesting. We already know that long distance season tickets are way higher in the UK compared to some other countries. For example:
(Annual prices)
London to Manchester: 14,948 GBP
Unlimited travel in Germany: 4,270 EUR
Unlimited travel in Switzerland: 3,860 CHF
It would be interesting if someone did a comparison of season tickets for shorter distances, for example 100 km, 50 km, 20 km etc.
Edit: London to Bristol with Europcar - I have found a quote for £170 - Budget quote was only £36 - with an extra £32 for damage excess reduction. Pays to shop around obviously....
Indeed. It all depends on what result you want.
I mean, if someone was anti-car then they could compare an advance train ticket against the hiring charge of a Rolls Royce and make it look like a car was massively more expensive.
For a car costing £80 and immediately taken on a long journey, chance of breaking down is almost a certainty.
I'm still wondering what you do afterwards? Keep it and lay out a fortune on servicing and repairs? Sell it (I've sold private and it's not fun) or scrap it? And the paperwork...
It's so not viable except as a theoretical argument, or if you're looking for a free advert.
It's so not viable except as a theoretical argument, or if you're looking for a free advert.
What that image doesn't say is how easy it is to get those cheapest fares. I used to be able to get from Horsham to Manchester for £17 each way. I've not been able to get those prices for years. Now whenever I want to visit family I am paying nearly £60 return with a couple of advances, and almost £100 if no advance tickets are available on the day or the day either side I want to travel. I'm looking at another holiday in Scotland later this year, I haven't found a journey one way for less than £100 and that is using a split ticket website. Yes you can get cheap tickets, if you are very lucky, but it is unlikely to be a regular privilege. Try doing the price comparison on the continent, first for walk up fares, then for booked in advance fares, but give the probability of being able to get the ticket at the much cheaper price, rather than the only slightly cheaper price.
Sell it, scrap it or give it away. Yes it is theoretical, but not practical due to the time and preparation needed beforehand. It would be better in terms of reality to compare the rail fare to hiring a car for the day. When I didn't have a car I was a member of the local car club (Co-wheels), which costs £25 to join, a £5 monthly fee, and hiring a medium car for a day costs around £38. When I was carless that compares favourably with a walk-up ticket from Horsham to Manchester for a weekend family visit.
It's interesting that in a forum full of railway enthusiasts, so many should find alternative modes of transport preferable for a variety of reasons.
The railway industry should take note that if even those who are well disposed towards rail travel find other options preferable, what chance have they with the general public !
The railway industry should take note that if even those who are well disposed towards rail travel find other options preferable, what chance have they with the general public !
VERY cheap cars can often be sold for about what was paid for them.
A car purchased for say £100 is probably still worth about the same after being used for a journey.
Sometimes they appreciate in value ! A car that cost £100 and made it from London to Bristol might sell for more than £100 "if it made it that far, it cant be that bad"
A car purchased for say £100 is probably still worth about the same after being used for a journey.
Sometimes they appreciate in value ! A car that cost £100 and made it from London to Bristol might sell for more than £100 "if it made it that far, it cant be that bad"
61653 HTAFC
Veteran Member
Though if you're comparing with walk-up prices, then chances are it's a journey you need to make at short-notice... so being able to get to an auction site which is hopefully open on that day, and actually buy a car that will work, is a bit of a gamble.
Stories like this make nice clickbait-y headlines but they don't make very good travel advice.
Sorting out VED and insurance presumably still takes a while even if both can be done online. Plus, do you go for one day of insurance? That's often not that cheap.
Phone your local scrapyard, or go online, they will come and collect the car, do all the paperwork, and, at today's prices give you around £110 for the car.
You would also automatically get any tax back based on full months left, so in the case of the article it would bring the cost down to under £100!
What a load of nonsense the article is, it does however highlight the high cost of walk up tickets.
As has been stated before a more accurate comparison would be the cost of hiring a vehicle. A couple of years ago 4 of my mates were doing a gig in central London, they hired a van for 24 hours to travel from West Yorkshire, £75 for 24 hours, plus another £75 for fuel total cost £150 for all 4 of them door to door.
I can fully see the comparison with hiring a car (as long as it includes any additional fee for them to bring the car to you, or the cost to you to go and collect it, as well as any collision damage waiver cover you are likely to want) but buying a car that you later sell again is, well, ridiculous.. Fun to discuss, but irrelevant.
Years ago a friend worked at Virgin Holidays and we got ten days in Vegas for a little over £200 with a hotel upgrade, Limo transfer to/from the airport and the flights themselves. Crazy mad cheap (this was the week of CES too, and included a stay over New Year).
Funnily enough I don't compare this to the cost of a walk-up return to Birmingham or Manchester on the train, saying I could have a fortnight (almost) in America for the same price. Or perhaps I should! There's even the Virgin link! Damn, I should go to the media right now!
. That's if you have a group of 4 that are travelling together - whereas the average load in a car is about 1.5. Car hire has its own pitfalls, notably the huge excess for damage/theft (£1000).
Personally, I choose my mode of transport based on more than simply cost. Of course cost is a factor and I'll book flights at times/dates to best suit a budget (where possible) but likewise, sometimes I'll need a car to lug lots of luggage or goods, and other times I'll let the train take the strain and have a drink or two and relax.
Thing is though if there's never a need to buy the £200 ticket, why is the TOC even selling it.
Most people will say well nobody buys that one. But it's still for sale and set at that rate and someone somewhere thinks that is reasonable to have set the price at that? And someone must be buying it otherwise presumably it'd cease to exist.
Like a lot of the WCML stations in the morning. Walk up Virgin returns to London easily approaching a few hundred quid and first class well over that.
Who is actually setting it and why? It's clearly very very poor value for money.
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Actually it's a good job the buses don't operate this pricing structure. Commit and confirm you'll be traveling at x time on x day, otherwise if you want to buy the return on the day and return when you like, it's 8 times the cost for the same bus.
Yes, exactly, the highest fares are too high and need to be reduced.
Who gets caught paying those highest fares?
Usually the foreign tourist or someone just arrived from overseas on a flight. It leaves a bad taste with the very people whom it is not good to offend.
If you've got a willing buyer there and then. Which is unlikely.
I've (twice) sold cars privately - in the £100 to £1,000 range. Costly, complicated and protracted!
Unless I've misunderstood you, that's exactly what National Express *do* do?
Ticket price myth busted by Loco2. They make these infographics from time to time by interrogating the data for ticket sales they have built up, and it shows UK prices are comparable if you plan ahead (and can pick the right day)!
This would be handy to show those who don't realise quite how wide the variation in ticket price can be, and might include quite a few rail supporters as well as detractors. As a case in point I had not realised, till I say the graph on here, how linear the rise in price was as the time ticked past; I had assumed in the UK there were only a few price points with quite wide bands of time during which fares were valid.
In terms of length from top to bottom, this post beats any others I have ever read on here by a mile.....Well it does if you click "expand" and then click the image to get the full size version.Ticket price myth busted by Loco2. They make these infographics from time to time by interrogating the data for ticket sales they have built up, and it shows UK prices are comparable if you plan ahead (and can pick the right day)!
This would be handy to show those who don't realise quite how wide the variation in ticket price can be, and might include quite a few rail supporters as well as detractors. As a case in point I had not realised, till I say the graph on here, how linear the rise in price was as the time ticked past; I had assumed in the UK there were only a few price points with quite wide bands of time during which fares were valid.
There is really no value in arguing that fares are low just because there's an Advance ticket from London to Glasgow for £20. This is pretty much a waste of time and not new.
The real way to compare fares is to look at the cost of the cheapest flexible or semi-flexible return, and to look at the prices of season tickets. It's also worth considering who is entitled to a discount (few people who live in the UK, travelling in th UK, but most people who live in Switzerland travelling there). The fares people are actually paying are what's relevant, not the fares in special offers or booked 6 months before the journey.
The real way to compare fares is to look at the cost of the cheapest flexible or semi-flexible return, and to look at the prices of season tickets. It's also worth considering who is entitled to a discount (few people who live in the UK, travelling in th UK, but most people who live in Switzerland travelling there). The fares people are actually paying are what's relevant, not the fares in special offers or booked 6 months before the journey.
The point on the infographic "savvy holiday makers start their holiday on a Wednesday, not a Friday" amuses me. Trying to find a holiday let in this country that begins on a Saturday these days is difficult enough, let alone Wednesday. They all seem to prefer Friday to Friday these days, much to my annoyance.
Bantamzen
Established Member
Up until a few years ago I'd have disagreed with that, my wife and I used to regularly book cottages in Whitby from a Wednesday to Wednesday. However more recently letting agents seemed to have stopped being so flexible, and as you say seeming to prefer Friday to Friday. Sadly for them (and for the owners), the loss of flexibility means that less people are now booking during festivals there as the from Friday option isn't to their requirements & as a result cottages are still being offered for let at knock down prices days before festivals are due to start.
That's interesting to know. You would have thought the owners would be up in arms.
The result is that people lose an extra days holiday and have to travel when trains are both more crowded and expensive.
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