Ten Millionth Oyster Card Issued
Transport for London (TfL) has announced that the 10 millionth Oyster card has been issued - say that "this is a major step towards TfL's aim of making Oyster smart card electronic ticketing the predominant means of payment throughout London's transport system. Around three quarters of all Underground and bus payments in London are now by Oyster card."
In the three years since the introduction of Oyster card, the proportion of cash payments on London's Underground and buses has fallen to just five per cent. The benefits of Oyster card payments in speed on the transport system are huge. Almost three times as many passengers can pass an Underground payment gate using Oyster card as can using printed tickets - 40 a minute compared to 15 a minute. Even greater time savings exist on buses of Oyster card payment compared to cash.The main gap in payments on Oyster card remains on surface rail where the train operating companies are yet to accept Oyster pre-pay. This affects 180,000 passengers a day. In May 2006, the Mayor offered a funding package of £20m to the train operators, which will finance the technology to accept the pay as you go system to be bought and installed at every station in Zones 1-6.
With the introduction on the rail system of the familiar six zones already used for Underground and Travelcard tickets, London can move to a unified ticketing system based on the Oyster smart card. The Mayor of London, Ken Livingstone, said: "Around three quarters of journeys on London's buses and Underground are now paid for by Oyster card compared to only five per cent by cash - bringing huge time savings to passengers and the transport system.
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