Cambridge - Aylesbury Vale Parkway validity

Farigiraf · 11 Mar 2024

I am planning a day out on Chiltern railways from Cambridge.
Date not confirmed yet, but it would be on a weekday with no strikes.

The route would be:

Cambridge-Kings Cross (leaving 10:14)
Kings Cross-Marylebone (Tube)
Marylebone-Aylesbury Vale Parkway
Aylesbury Vale Parkway-Aylesbury
Aylesbury-Princes Risborough
Princes Risborough-High Wycombe
High Wycombe-Marylebone
Marylebone-South Ruislip
South Ruislip-Liverpool Street (tube)
Liverpool Street-Cambridge (leaving 17:43, arriving 19:09)

Would a 'travel is valid via any permitted route' and 'this journey includes a fare across London by tube, DLR or train' Cambridge-Aylesbury Vale Parkway off peak day return be:
- Valid via both Great Northern and Greater Anglia
- Valid From AVP to MYB changing at Aylesbury, Princes Risborough and High Wycombe
Additionally, would the cross-london tube/rail journey be valid going MYB-SRU-LST? otherwise I will use contactless for that part
Thanks

Clarification: The off-peak day return is for Cambridge-Aylesbury and back to Marylebone, and Liverpool Street-Cambridge. Marylebone-South Ruislip then South Ruislip-Liverpool Street would be done with contactless.

RailUK Forums

jfollows · 11 Mar 2024

Valid national rail routes are shown on maps at https://data.atoc.org/routeing-maps
Cambridge-London

KE
WA

London-Aylesbury

CI

Definitely valid to Liverpool Street or King's Cross from Cambridge

EDIT Essentially Aylesbury is the routeing point for Aylesbury Vale Parkway, then the only routes defined are LONDON, in which case the two legs to/from London are considered separately as above.

Farigiraf · 11 Mar 2024

jfollows said:
Definitely valid to Liverpool Street or King's Cross from Cambridge

Great, thanks

jfollows said:
London-Aylesbury

CI

Looks like that is valid via High Wycombe, and there's no real way for the ticket machine at Marylebone to know how many changes I made to get there

regarding the cross-London tube journey, there's an old thread with a link to the NR site showing the valid Maltese Cross stations, but that page has been removed (?) following the National rail website changes. Is this list still available somewhere?

If going contactless Marylebone-LST via south Ruislip, would I need to touch out and back in at South Ruislip, otherwise wouldn't it think I made a zone 1 only journey?

jfollows · 11 Mar 2024

Farigiraf said:
regarding the cross-London tube journey, there's an old thread with a link to the NR site showing the valid Maltese Cross stations, but that page has been removed (?) following the National rail website changes. Is this list still available somewhere?

See #2 which I copied from the NR site a few months ago (because off-site links tend to die).

Farigiraf · 11 Mar 2024

jfollows said:
See #2 which I copied from the NR site a few months ago (because off-site links tend to die).

Looks like it's not valid to/from either South Ruislip or West Ruislip (or surprisingly Harrow-on-the-Hill).

yorkie · 11 Mar 2024

Farigiraf said:
High Wycombe-Marylebone
Marylebone-South Ruislip

Not a valid double-back.

Farigiraf said:
South Ruislip-Liverpool Street (tube)

Not a valid cross-London transfer.

Farigiraf said:
Additionally, would the cross-london tube journey be valid going MYB-SRU-LST?

A superlative suggestion, sir. With just two minor flaws. One, MYB-SRU is not the "tube". And two, SRU-LST isn't a valid cross-London transfer.

Farigiraf · 11 Mar 2024

yorkie said:
Not a valid double-back.

This part would have been part of the cross-London transfer (as it is within the zones) which I now know is not valid, therefore I will do it with contactless.

yorkie said:
One, MYB-SRU is not the "tube". And two, SRU-LST isn't a valid cross-London transfer.

Maltese Cross tickets are valid on certain national rail journeys within London (although not here). I have edited the post to clarify things.

Watershed · 11 Mar 2024

Farigiraf said:
If going contactless Marylebone-LST via south Ruislip, would I need to touch out and back in at South Ruislip, otherwise wouldn't it think I made a zone 1 only journey?

Yes and no. There's no inherent requirement to touch out intermediately when travelling using PAYG. You can take any route you like, even if it's circuitous or involves more Zones than the fare assumes.

However, there is a maximum journey time (MJT) which limits the extent to which you can do this. This varies depending on the Zones you travel through - so for a Marylebone-LST journey it would likely only deem you to be travelling through Zone 1. It also varies depending on the time of day and day of the week.

For a Z1-Z1 journey the MJT is 1h30m on weekdays between 04:30-19:00. So if you touch in at Marylebone just before the train to South Ruislip (SRU) leaves, and are lucky in not having to wait too long at SRU for a Central line service, you should just make it. But it will be fairly tight - trains to SRU take 18-24 minutes (note: in some of the gaps it can be quicker to change at West Ruislip - you could of course join the Central line there too), and the Central line runs every 7 minutes (in theory - noting its current unreliability!) and takes 44 minutes to LST.

For example, consider the following timings:

you touch in 5 minutes before a train to SRU leaves
it takes 24 minutes to get to SRU
you have to wait 7 minutes for a Central line train at SRU
it takes 44 minutes to get to LST
it takes you 5 minutes to get from the Central line platforms to the barriers at LST

This would leave you with only have 5 minutes slack before you exceed the 1h30m MJT.

Exceeding the MJT will result in being charged two maximum fares, as the system will assume you made two incomplete journeys. TfL will likely refund you the difference between the maximum fares and the 'correct' fare for the journey if you call them up, but obviously this is a bit of a hassle and does require your Oyster or contactless card to be registered with them.

If you want to avoid all possibility of exceeding the MJT then the sensible thing to do would be to touch out and back in at SRU.

CyrusWuff · 11 Mar 2024

Watershed said:
If you want to avoid all possibility of exceeding the MJT then the sensible thing to do would be to touch out and back in at SRU.

It's possibly worth pointing out that there's a validator in the corridor between the Chiltern and Central Line platforms which may help there - rather than going through the barriers and back. (Assuming it's still active, of course. The one at West Ruislip wasn't the last time I passed through.) Hopefully @MikeWh will confirm or tell me I'm wrong!

Watershed · 11 Mar 2024

CyrusWuff said:
It's possibly worth pointing out that there's a validator in the corridor between the Chiltern and Central Line platforms which may help there - rather than going through the barriers and back. (Assuming it's still active, of course. The one at West Ruislip wasn't the last time I passed through.) Hopefully @MikeWh will confirm or tell me I'm wrong!

The validator wouldn't be hugely useful though, because you can't touch out and back in at a standalone validator without leaving 15 (?) minutes between the touches. Whereas gatelines are directional so it's possible to touch out and straight back in.

Farigiraf · 11 Mar 2024

Watershed said:
Yes and no. There's no inherent requirement to touch out intermediately when travelling using PAYG. You can take any route you like, even if it's circuitous or involves more Zones than the fare assumes.

However, there is a maximum journey time (MJT) which limits the extent to which you can do this. This varies depending on the Zones you travel through - so for a Marylebone-LST journey it would likely only deem you to be travelling through Zone 1. It also varies depending on the time of day and day of the week.

For a Z1-Z1 journey the MJT is 1h30m on weekdays between 04:30-19:00. So if you touch in at Marylebone just before the train to South Ruislip (SRU) leaves, and are lucky in not having to wait too long at SRU for a Central line service, you should just make it. But it will be fairly tight - trains to SRU take 18-24 minutes (note: in some of the gaps it can be quicker to change at West Ruislip - you could of course join the Central line there too), and the Central line runs every 7 minutes (in theory - noting its current unreliability!) and takes 44 minutes to LST.

For example, consider the following timings:

you touch in 5 minutes before a train to SRU leaves

it takes 24 minutes to get to SRU

you have to wait 7 minutes for a Central line train at SRU

it takes 44 minutes to get to LST

it takes you 5 minutes to get from the Central line platforms to the barriers at LST

This would leave you with only have 5 minutes slack before you exceed the 1h30m MJT.

Exceeding the MJT will result in being charged two maximum fares, as the system will assume you made two incomplete journeys. TfL will likely refund you the difference between the maximum fares and the 'correct' fare for the journey if you call them up, but obviously this is a bit of a hassle and does require your Oyster or contactless card to be registered with them.

If you want to avoid all possibility of exceeding the MJT then the sensible thing to do would be to touch out and back in at SRU.

Thanks for the detailed info. I think I'll make the decision at South Ruislip, depending on what time I arrived into the station and how long it is until the next Central line eastbound. Will use a timer on my phone to keep track.
The other option would be to get out at Sudbury & Harrow Road (this being one of the very few trains that stop there) or Sudbury Hill Harrow, walk to the Piccadilly line, tube to North Ealing, then dash to Ealing Broadway and catch an Elizabeth Line (about 6-7 mins faster) although I wouldn't risk money and/or time on traffic.

hkstudent · 11 Mar 2024

Watershed said:
Yes and no. There's no inherent requirement to touch out intermediately when travelling using PAYG. You can take any route you like, even if it's circuitous or involves more Zones than the fare assumes.

However, there is a maximum journey time (MJT) which limits the extent to which you can do this. This varies depending on the Zones you travel through - so for a Marylebone-LST journey it would likely only deem you to be travelling through Zone 1. It also varies depending on the time of day and day of the week.

For a Z1-Z1 journey the MJT is 1h30m on weekdays between 04:30-19:00. So if you touch in at Marylebone just before the train to South Ruislip (SRU) leaves, and are lucky in not having to wait too long at SRU for a Central line service, you should just make it. But it will be fairly tight - trains to SRU take 18-24 minutes (note: in some of the gaps it can be quicker to change at West Ruislip - you could of course join the Central line there too), and the Central line runs every 7 minutes (in theory - noting its current unreliability!) and takes 44 minutes to LST.

For example, consider the following timings:

you touch in 5 minutes before a train to SRU leaves

it takes 24 minutes to get to SRU

you have to wait 7 minutes for a Central line train at SRU

it takes 44 minutes to get to LST

it takes you 5 minutes to get from the Central line platforms to the barriers at LST

This would leave you with only have 5 minutes slack before you exceed the 1h30m MJT.

Exceeding the MJT will result in being charged two maximum fares, as the system will assume you made two incomplete journeys. TfL will likely refund you the difference between the maximum fares and the 'correct' fare for the journey if you call them up, but obviously this is a bit of a hassle and does require your Oyster or contactless card to be registered with them.

If you want to avoid all possibility of exceeding the MJT then the sensible thing to do would be to touch out and back in at SRU.

Actually, in payg system, from Marylebone NR to Liverpool Street LU is actually a zone 1-5-1 journey, as there are no inside pay area zone 1 journey.

So it's actually a 11 zone journey and having maximum journey time of 2 hour 50 minutes

Farigiraf said:
Thanks for the detailed info. I think I'll make the decision at South Ruislip, depending on what time I arrived into the station and how long it is until the next Central line eastbound. Will use a timer on my phone to keep track.
The other option would be to get out at Sudbury & Harrow Road (this being one of the very few trains that stop there) or Sudbury Hill Harrow, walk to the Piccadilly line, tube to North Ealing, then dash to Ealing Broadway and catch an Elizabeth Line (about 6-7 mins faster) although I wouldn't risk money and/or time on traffic.

As mentioned, you actually have 2 hour 50 minutes instead of 1 hour 30 minutes as it's a 11 zone journey. Unless you started at Marylebone LU instead, which shouldn't be your case if you are on Chilterns railway.

Meanwhile, there are Chilterns service between High Wycombe and West Ruislip, it may worth thinking dropping the High Wycombe to Marylebone journey to save the fares?

Watershed · 11 Mar 2024

hkstudent said:
Actually, in payg system, from Marylebone NR to Liverpool Street LU is actually a zone 1-5-1 journey, as there are no inside pay area zone 1 journey.

Are you sure about that? There is no published fare so you can't be sure what the assumed Zones are. To be on the safe side, you have to assume it's deemed a Z1-1 journey.

hkstudent · 11 Mar 2024

Watershed said:
Are you sure about that? There is no published fare so you can't be sure what the assumed Zones are. To be on the safe side, you have to assume it's deemed a Z1-1 journey.

The logic of zones crossed is based on the routing. Reason why the route fare is not published is based on the fact that it's being too circuitous and not to put in public domain.

Farigiraf · 11 Mar 2024

hkstudent said:
As mentioned, you actually have 2 hour 50 minutes instead of 1 hour 30 minutes as it's a 11 zone journey. Unless you started at Marylebone LU instead, which shouldn't be your case if you are on Chilterns railway.

If this is correct (although @Watershed would have to verify this), surely it wouldn't charge an 11 zone journey? NR gateline to LU gateline should be applicable in some places such as Paddington-Ealing Common.

hkstudent said:
Meanwhile, there are Chilterns service between High Wycombe and West Ruislip, it may worth thinking dropping the High Wycombe to Marylebone journey to save the fares?

I'm intending to catch this train as it's one of the four that afternoon to call at Sudbury & Harrow Road, although I was intending to go to (change at) South Ruislip anyway which the High Wycombe stopper skips.

hkstudent · 11 Mar 2024

Farigiraf said:
If this is correct (although @Watershed would have to verify this), surely it wouldn't charge an 11 zone journey?

I'm intending to catch this train as it's one of the four that afternoon to call at Sudbury & Harrow Road, although I was intending to go to (change at) South Ruislip which the High Wycombe stopper skips.

The charge is a zone 1-5 journey, on the system's assumption that you go via Harrow On the Hill which is the lowest zone that connects to LU within barrier. But it's uncertain about whether it's on a London Underground fare scale of £3.50 or mixed NR-LU scale of £5.60.

Meanwhile, oystercard maybe unable to calculate the correct fare at instant as it's too complex in zones passed, so will likely to overcharge you on the day. Maybe better to use contactless payment unless you have Railcard discount on oystercard.

Farigiraf · 11 Mar 2024

hkstudent said:
Meanwhile, oystercard maybe unable to calculate the correct fare at instant as it's too complex in zones passed, so will likely to overcharge you on the day. Maybe better to use contactless payment unless you have Railcard discount on oystercard.

I am intending on using contactless anyway.

hkstudent · 11 Mar 2024

Farigiraf said:
I am intending on using contactless anyway.

That's good.

I had couple of cases years ago for doing over circuitous journey by oystercard and would require backend calculation overnight to return the fare.

PlusPoint on contactless is that they need to do the fare calculation overnight so im principle should be accurate.
(Note: if spotted the miscalculation in most uneventful situation, use webform to tell the story so that the case officer can understand better and provide the accurate refund)

Cambridge - Aylesbury Vale Parkway validity

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