Proof of Payment: Metro systems with No Fare Gates?

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Hi, my name's Reece. I'm a passionate Creator, Transportation Planner, and Software Developer, interested in rapid transportation all around my home base of Toronto, Canada, as well as the whole world!

[PG-nfwx]

European "proof of payment" systems have usually a large amount of people with subscription tickets, it's rather uncommon for residents to pay per ride. that's why a gateline would be an useless obstacle.

[tessc]

Since we have our new 3€/day public transit ticket in Austria now, it's great that the Vienna subway doesn't have turnstiles. Most of the time you don't even think about it and just walk down the stairs and get on a train. I think that also makes transit a bit more convenient.

[dalailambda]

Funny story, I actually got stuck in Queen Street Station in Glasgow because of this.
Couldn't buy a ticket at my station because it shuts early in the afternoon.
No problem, I'll just buy one from the Heckie on the train.
There was no Heckie on the train.
No problem, I'll buy one from the Heckie at the Queen street fare gates.
There was no Heckie at the fare gate.
No problem, I'll use the ticket machine.
The ticket machine hadn't been programmed with my home station in it, so I could not buy a ticket....
Eventually some staff came out, let my buy a return ticket for a different station, then hand wrote me a note explaining that I was allowed to go all the way home should I be challenged...
10/10 anecdote for my very angry friends who had to wait so long for me.

[davidspanel]

Living in central Europe, I always thought proof of payment to be the the normal way... Of the metros I rode, the majority have it (Prague, Berlin, Vienna, Munich, Budapest, Rome, Helsinki), while I encountered turnstiles only in London, Paris, Amsterdam (there, they have them even on trams!!!) and Stockholm.

[dernwine]

I think the thing you're missing is there is also a highly cultural aspect to Proof of Payment systems. I've spend most of my life between Germany and England and proof of payment works in the former, but I don't think would work in the latter. In Germany I almost never had my tickets checked (unless I was on ICE), because the assumption in Germany is kind of "if we give you a rule you'll stick to it." while in Britain I'm used to not only having a fare gate, but also a proof of payment system on top of it, the expectation is that people will try to get out of payment or get around the rules. And yes, anecdotally I've found that this is very true, when I was living in a British Ex-pat community in Germany they violated the trust of the proof of payment system frequently, while to myself and my german raised friends the thought of doing so was rather alien. To some degree I think it's a self reinforcing cycle: "We dont' trust you to pay so we'll make sure you pay." Encourages fair avoidance. While "We treat you like an adult and do spot checks once in a blue moon." encourages payment, but there definitely is a cultural element to it too.

[sagichnicht]

The fare evasion issue is pretty much a non issue in Vienna which is entirely "proof of payment". Non-paying riders are in the low single digit percentage. Turnstyles in metros are absurdly expensive because they bloat up stations which are the main cost factor in metro systems. So I am pretty convinced having a turnstyle system in the U-Bahn would actually reduce the income of the Wiener Linien rather than increasing it because additional fares would be eaten up by additional costs.

The vastly superior operational features of proof of payment systems just make them my clear preference. One can create very efficient transfer stops, short and direct. Flow of people is much more efficient too as there are no big obstacles hindering the flow of people. Also as no tapping is required at bus and trams, boarding works faster and more efficient too.

Most regular riders in Vienna have time cards. So you don't have to care about validation or anything. In fact, with the the "Klimaticket" an increasing number has now a yearly pass not just for Vienna but basically all PT in all of Austria. So you can go from any point to any point in Austria without having to bother about fares or tickets. Just check the connection and which lines to take and do it. This sytem does not only save the companies a lot of time and money but also the customer.

[potayto-potahto]

I think the biggest benefit of barrier-free transit systems is it seems to change the mindset of users. Instead of getting a driver's license, you get a yearly transit pass. Then you can go anywhere in the city and transit is just there for you. You pay once for something and use it all year, rather than being forbidden entry until you pay for the benefit of using someone else's transit system.

[thexalon]

My first encounter with this was on the DLR in London - we watched the guard catch someone who hadn't paid, and the guard was trying to cut them some slack by writing them down as a tourist (which had a lower fine) while the person they had caught insisted they weren't one (because apparently a higher fine was worth not being a tourist).

[pabloaviles]

It's actually pretty amazing where I live (Vienna), I have a year ticket which was only 365EUR and all I have to do is show the fare controller my app, and it's all good. No stress on having to pull out my wallet/card every time I want to get onto the U-Bahn, S-Bahn, or the tram 👍🏼👍🏼👍🏼

Side Note: The fare evasion fine here is very hefty (around 110EUR) so fare evasion isn't really a problem in Vienna :)

[timeimp]

I had no idea not having gates was "an honesty system." Here in Sydney, most of the core stations and key interchanges on the heavy rail network are all gated (same with the metro). But every light rail and virtually 90% of the rest of the commuter stations are just "here's a ready, tap on when you turn up." (Oh, and the lovely "Transport officers checking Opal cards" is always a fun one at 5am in the morning commute 😴😨😠).

Can't wait for the next video Reece, and well done on this one!

[unknownPLfan]

Random enforcement that's just frequent enough but not either too rare or too frequent feels like it should be enough. I've ridden extensively on proof of payment systems and the thought that I could be checked at any moment and have to pay 60 Euro for a 2 Euro trip is enough to keep me in line. It's a small thing, but I don't need the extra stress in my day, and I'm sure this also makes it so that most people follow the "honor" system as well.

A downside that occurs in German cities is that it can make paying for fares complicated. German cities also have distance based fares, and if you're not careful to pay for every fare zone you traverse regardless of whether you get off the train at any point, you can get caught and fined the same fine for having the wrong ticket and sometimes even if ticket machines let you select between two specific stops to determine your price, you can end up still getting fined since sometimes you have multiple modes to chose from when traveling between those two stops and you need to account for which mode traverses the fewest zones (this is genuinely rare, but possible). On the plus side, having prices be entirely distance based, means that there are always free transfers between modes.

[gentuxable]

In Switzerland we have EasyRide, you open the app on your phone, swipe right to check in and swipe back left to check out they will collect your phone location info and gather all your routes throughout the day and charge your payment method overnight. The advantage is that i.e. you don't have to consider if you want to take a day pass or a single ticket that is valid few hours before buying because it will calculate the better option for you. Most of the times it can give you a cheaper fare than if you were to buy the ticket yourself.

[danielrose]

There is a further advantage of not having fare gates, which is often used in Germany. Your public transportation fee is often included in other stuff, which would be pretty tough to combine all into a machine readable form for the fare gate. Examples are Long distance rail tickets (including some international ones), parking tickets (P&R), tickets for music or sport events, plane tickets or multiple other.

[coastercrutchfield]

As a transport systems engineer (who just recently started working on AFC systems projects for rail and bus projects) one interesting thing that I never realized before working on these projects were the complicated back-office and payment systems that we also don’t see or think about as a typical user as we only ever interact with fare gates in stations, but don’t think about behind the scenes of these complex systems, especially in places like London who take both smart card payments as well as external contactless payments. I think it would be interesting to have a follow up video relating to that, as the “behind the scenes” of transit infrastructure is what got me into the career path to begin with :)

[CZpersi]

Prague used to have fare gates, but removed them in the 1980s, or something. Debates about their re-installation usually led nowhere. Instead, they use ticket inspectors, who are a problem of their own (psychological factors, language barriers etc.).

[Fanw]

This is an absolutely superb video which covers the subject very comprehensively. I would just emphasize that payment by smartphone App is now very common in many parts of Europe, including the UK. Unfortunately, some British experts think that APPS make smartcards like OYSTER or OV Chipkaart redundant. This is rubbish. Even in high-tec Sweden where everyone seems to own a smartphone, many passengers prefer the regional smartcard over the smartphone app.

[treinenliefde]

Here in the netherlands we actually use both systems which is quite interesting. Generally all the large stations have rows of gates while smaller stations have proof of payment systems. I definitely much prefer the proof of payment system, since in almost all cases the shops and facilities are in the 'regulated' section which is an absolute pain if you just need to use a toilet or want to buy some snacks

[kytkosaurus]

It would be interesting to compare the share of longer term subscriptions in the proof of payment and fare-gates systems. I would expect the proof of payment systems to have more of them. And maybe also more zones, tickets for time interval and not for individualt trip, etc. whereas the fare gate systems will probably have more of different prices according to trip length, and so on.

If you have large share of "subscriptions" you don't have to install so much tap points / stampers, etc. In fact when visiting another city, the first thing I look for are whole day and several day tickets. If they have them I usually buy them if the price is at least comparable to the expected number of individual trips. It eliminates the problem of forgetting to pay/validate before each trip and it removes the hesitation to use transit for short rides that are technically walkable on their own, but can add to too much walking for the day.

[chilledfrogs]

Being currently in Oslo but having lived in Paris for a while, I really appreciate how much they could integrate the metro into city infrastructure due to having no fare gates; as mentioned in the video, metro stations here are frequently just 2 or 1 platforms and some stairs and ramps (of course, tram and bus stations are very simple as well), since on top of it there is platform sharing everywhere. Pretty much no one even uses the validators anymore since tickets are available very conveniently on the public transit app (even discounted ones, yet again essentially on the honour system), so I always just walk (or run) in for instance. All this said though, Norway is an incredibly trusting country, even more so than Germany I think, so it's definitely a very cultural thing to do it this way as well

[fawfulfan]

Los Angeles has kind of a weird hybrid model. There are physical fare gates at the entrances to the underground stations. At the surface and elevated stations, and the transfers on underground stations, there are boxes you're expected to tap to validate fare. You COULD walk past them without paying if you wanted, but there are random inspections at the exits of stations to make sure you validated properly. When I lived there I'd be stopped maybe once a week or so by one of these random inspections. I guess you could call this "proof of payment lite." Whether your trip is enforced by a faregate or proof of payment ends up depending on where your origin and destination are.