Ticketing and Concessionary Travel on Public Transport - United ...

43. There was a clear consensus among our witnesses that having a common st<strong>and</strong>ard,
such as ITSO, was in principle the right approach. However, industry witnesses were
critical of the ITSO organisation, the Government’s project management <strong>and</strong> the speed at
which the ITSO specification has developed. 44 Nonetheless, a significant amount of
progress has already been made with ITSO: it is the st<strong>and</strong>ard for concessionary travel bus
passes in Engl<strong>and</strong> <strong>and</strong> Scotl<strong>and</strong> 45 <strong>and</strong> it has been included in the conditions for new rail
franchises. It now seems certain that ITSO will be the st<strong>and</strong>ard for transport smartcards on
bus <strong>and</strong> rail networks outside London, for the near future.
44. The Government funding for ITSO-compliant concessionary travel cards is likely, in
the long run, to give a boost to the introduction of ITSO equipment on buses. However,
this is proceeding slowly <strong>and</strong> few of the 15 million concessionary travel passes will function
as smartcards in the first instance. Of the 324 travel concession authorities, 253 are non-
ITSO-compliant; <strong>and</strong> only 5 to 10% of the bus fleet will be ITSO equipped by the end of
2008. 46 Further take-up will depend on how well the Government <strong>and</strong> travel concession
authorities encourage operators to equip their buses with ITSO smartcard readers. Given
the potential of ITSO smartcards to provide passenger data, to allocate costs more
accurately <strong>and</strong> to enable concessionary travel across the UK, it is important that ITSO
continues to develop quickly. 47
45. Transport authorities <strong>and</strong> operators have sought to ensure compatibility amongst these
new technologies through a set of ITSO st<strong>and</strong>ards. The English national concessionary
travel scheme passes that are now being issued are ITSO-compliant smartcards. A number
of smaller ITSO-based smartcard schemes are also in operation or planned, such as
Yorcard in South Yorkshire, which is to be piloted on three bus routes in Sheffield <strong>and</strong> on
rail routes to Doncaster.
44 Ev 65
45 Although concessionary travel passes in Scotl<strong>and</strong> have been ITSO-compliant for several years, the installation of
smartcard machine readers on buses has taken longer than anticipated due to the need to conduct integrity testing
on the ITSO equipment. Approximately 700 Stagecoach buses are now equipped.
46 Ev 198
47 Ev 65
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