cactustwirly
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Then how can e-tickets open the gates then?
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Sold Flimsy Bog Roll Ticket at Manchester Piccadilly Ticket Office
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Then how can e-tickets open the gates then?
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gingerheid
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And if we're going to start doing things ourselves them often we can often also transport ourselves to our destinations too!
I suppose being non-standard in a rest of the world context is bad if we want to buy cheap stuff off the shelf in China, which is a shame as I'm sure we could make ticket printers in this country, and that there'd be people happy to take the associated jobs of designing them and so on
Well they haven't done that yet (not one which works, anyway) and these 'new' formats have been around for quite some time.
At Chester, at least, it would appear they can't.
E-Tickets (on paper and mobile for instance) carry a lot more information on them and the gates and have the ability to recognise the ticket and let the person in or out if appropriate.
Sam
Centre of mass. There are still significantly more people using magstripe tickets. It's starting to change though, all of the barriers in Scotland have been upgraded to support smart cards, I don't know if they'll do barcode readers as the current operator doesn't seem too keen on e-tickets.
I'd much rather prefer that the railway concentrated on being as efficient at doing its job of transporting people from where they are to where they want to be, rather than being a job creation enterprise.
cactustwirly
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How come? Surely the QR codes on the paper tickets are bigger, so can store the same amount of information?
Puffing Devil
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Same at Crewe and Macclesfield. Crewe do have a printer for X-London mag stripe tickets.
I think we're getting confused here.
The ticket machines that print out the Credit Card Sized Ticket Stock and come with a small Aztec code on them are only capable of handling a small amount of information.
The codes of them are relatively small in comparison to those on an e-ticket which are much larger in comparison.
I shall attempt to get hold of an example of the CCST stock with an Aztec code on it, to show you the difference in size between them both.
Hope this helps.
Sam
In any half-decent operation, appropriate equipment to read 'new' formats would be put in place at the same time (or even prior to) the introduction of those formats ... especially if the powers that be wanted to encourage use of the newer formats.
cactustwirly
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I didn't know that CCST tickets had QR codes on them, what sort of ticket types have them then?
alistairlees
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Most gatelines now have one or more barcode reader aisles (before anyone names a gateline / TOC that doesn't, please read the first word in this post). And most on train staff should have had the equipment and training to scan barcodes. If all the kit had been put in first, over several years, before any was being used, then there would be several threads on here about the waste of money it was. Besides, this change to introduce barcode / eTickets started as an experiment, and has since become very successful - and it's that success that has enabled the business case to invest in scanning and validation equipment to be made.
They really are bus style tickets coming from what appear to be bus ticket machines.
alistairlees
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The standard supports having Aztec barcodes (small size) on CCST tickets. So far as I know only a few TVMs ever did them (they might still do), such as the ones at York. No National Rail tickets use, or have used, QR codes, so far as I know.
bb21
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You are expecting well thought out co-ordination in this fragmented franchise system for a national roll-out ?
How long have you been around? For that to happen, we need to have a government department who knew what they were doing to start with, let alone what was proposed and decided on a few years back.Obviously under the current regime, for a nationwide roll-out things have to be phased alongside franchise renewals, and hardware cannot be installed across all locations in any case even if everything were under one umbrella, so there will be graduated phases, although the speed at which things are happening is rather, well, ...
Why is it stuffed in your pocket and not folded and placed into your ticket wallet?
Even if you fold it, it's too wide for the wallet. And the more times you fold something, the less likelihood it will be readable.
Even traditional card tickets aren't immune to this issue, which is why we have ticket wallets in the first place.
The paper bog roll design just isn't suitable for tickets sold in advance.
Pedantic, I know, but the issue is with tickets *printed* a long time in advance.
I'm not sure how it negates the issue.
GTR use tablets paired (over Bluetooth) to standard paper ticket printers. I can't see why someone couldn't produce a printer with a higher DPI that can print Aztec codes with the same level of detail as on a bit of paper.
Obviously they looked around at what was available and the 'bog roll' printers were available now, or cheaper. I do find them a pain to store in a wallet, and they easily get creased. If folded on the code itself, I can imagine it causing some delays when attempting to scan them.
To be honest, by designing a suitable printer, there's nothing to say you couldn't print double sided on ticket stock designed for mobile printers.
Obviously they looked around at what was available and the 'bog roll' printers were available now, or cheaper. I do find them a pain to store in a wallet, and they easily get creased. If folded on the code itself, I can imagine it causing some delays when attempting to scan them.
To be honest, by designing a suitable printer, there's nothing to say you couldn't print double sided on ticket stock designed for mobile printers.
tsr
Established Member
Sadly neither of those is the case in many areas - certainly only a small fraction of London+SE stations currently have barcode readers on gatelines, and there are many hundreds of revenue/onboard staff yet to be trained.
The ECML station ticket offices seem most likely to issue credit card / magstripe tickets with AZTEC codes, in my experience. Particularly Kings Cross.
Because the durability is much less of an issue for tickets collected on the day of travel.
True.
But I'm sure a lot of people would rather have their ticket beforehand, than risk a problem with collection on the day. I know I would.
alistairlees
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Southeastern, c2c, Merseyrail and much of ScotRail won't have barcode readers on gatelines. Nor will London Overground I believe (not sure about TfL Rail). Everywhere else will. That's "some" areas, not "many" areas.
When I travelled quite frequently for work I collected my tickets on the day about half the time. In well over three or four hundred times I was unable to collect the tickets twice that I can recall.
I'm comfortable collecting on the day though, to be fair, my local station has a very good booking office who could normally print the ticket if the machine was out of order.
I like to be prepared.
tsr
Established Member
Many of the busiest areas, then. And even leaving aside the obvious fact that those are all networks which are basically full to capacity and, between them, account for a significant proportion of National Rail journeys each day, there are other companies where gates are being upgraded slowly and only at a few locations...
To each their own, you'll just have to find a way to store your "bog roll" tickets then as the tide is very much against pieces of orange cardboard.
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