mass public transport cost weirdness
i’ve spent my last 5 years in melbourne. those who have lived there and used its public transportation system must be familiar with the zoning system. if you don’t belong to this cohort of people, here’s a brief explanation.
areas in melbourne belong to at least a zone. some belong to two adjacent zones. for example, see the melbourne train map [pdf]. the stations with a yellow line only belong to zone 1 only. the ones with a blue line only belong to zone 2 only. the ones with both belong to both zones. for example, the flinders street station (see the city loop) belongs to zone 1, the upfield station (in the north) belongs to zone 2, the sunshine station (in the west) belongs to both zone 1+2. to travel in zone 1 areas, one needs a zone 1 ticket. to travel in zone 2 areas, one needs a zone 2 ticket. to travel in the overlapped area, one can choose to use a zone 1 or 2 ticket. to travel from a zone 1 only area to a zone 2 only area or vice versa, one needs a zone 1+2 ticket. however, if one travels from a zone 1 area to an overlapped area, only a zone 1 ticket is needed. similarly for zone 2.
the zones where one travels determine the price of the ticket. a full fare daily zone 1 only ticket currently costs $6.10. a full fare daily zone 2 only ticket costs $4.30. a full fare daily zone 1+2 ticket costs $9.70 (if travelling on monday to friday after 9 am, an off-peak ticket is available at full fare for $9.00). now here comes the weirdness. suppose abraham travels from williamstown (refer to the williamstown line in the south) to glenroy (refer to the broadmeadows line in the north) and david from murrumbeena to clayton (for both, refer to the pakenham line in southeast). see that abraham travels far farther than david, yet he spends less. if both take a taxi, abraham has to spend much more than david.
hmmm…
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