Tube and bus passengers will pay £250m more a year to Transport for London as a result of the annual fares hike that comes into force on Sunday, it can be revealed.
National rail passengers also face a 5.9 per cent hike in average fares – with the cost of an annual season ticket to the capital rising by about £280, according to new research.
Mayor Sadiq Khan decided to follow the Government’s lead in imposing an average 5.9 per cent hike on TfL services, which include the Elizabeth line and the London Overground.
This means he is imposing the biggest fares hike in more than a decade on London transport.
The cost of a zone 1 peak-hours Tube journey will jump 12 per cent, from £2.50 to £2.80, while bus fares will increase by 6.1 per cent, up 10p to £1.75.
In addition, black taxi fares, which are set by TfL, will increase by 7.6 per cent from next month.
Passenger groups said they were “particularly disappointed” that Mr Khan chose to increase bus fares for a second successive year as buses are the most popular form of transport in London, with about five million trips a day, and are mostly relied upon by low-income Londoners,.
Michael Roberts, chief executive of London TravelWatch, said: “Many Londoners are already feeling the pinch with cost-of-living pressures so this fares rise of 5.9 per cent across TfL services will be challenging for many people.”
TfL predicts the increases will generate an additional £256 million in the next 12 months – about £164m more on the Underground, £72m from buses and £21m from journeys on the Overground, Elizabeth line, Docklands Light Railway and Croydon tram.
Latest figures show that journeys on TfL services have reached 79 per cent of pre-pandemic levels, with £4.2bn expected to be generated from fares in the current 2022/23 financial year – about £600m less than in 2019.
The Campaign for Better Transport will this weekend unveil research showing how the increase in national rail fares has added hundreds of pounds to the cost of travelling regularly from the capital’s commuter belt.
Despite the Department for Transport capping the increase well below the rate of inflation, it is the biggest hike since rail fares rose by six per cent in 2012.
The increases come with more Tube and train strikes planned from March 15. Walkouts by members of Aslef and the RMT on Budget day are almost certain to close the Underground for 24 hours.
Four days of 24-hour RMT strikes on the national railways will start on March 16, and run until April 1.
There were 10 national rail strikes in the last three months of the year, and almost a full week of disruption when a RMT strike was called off too late to restore services.
Across the country, only 62.3 per cent of trains ran on time between October and December and 4.5 per cent of services were cancelled – 10 times more than the same period prior to the pandemic – according to latest figures from the Office of Rail and Road.
The Elizabeth line was the most punctual railway in the UK, with 83.8 per cent of its trains arriving on time between October and December. A total of 2.8 per cent of Elizabeth line trains were cancelled.
The London Overground was the sixth best railway in the UK, with 71 per cent of trains on time. It cancelled 4.1 per cent of trains.
Mr Khan deliberately chose to push fares higher in central London to allow him to implement a lower percentage increase in the suburbs, in recognition of the impact of the widening of the ultra-low emission zone, which will increase reliance on public transport.
A spokesman for Mr Khan said: “The mayor’s hands are tied this year due to the strict conditions set by the Government in the emergency funding agreement for TfL following the pandemic. This means he has been left with no alternative but to match the Government’s fare rise on national rail services.
“All the money raised from fares will go to ensuring we protect and improve our world-class transport network, investing in Tube, bus and Overground services across the capital.”
The spokesman said the partial fares freeze introduced by Mr Khan in his first term meant that fares were 12 per cent cheaper than they would otherwise have been, meaning bus fares would be rising to £1.90 not £1.75.
The Department for Transport said: “TfL fare increases remain, as always, a decision for the Mayor, and it is incorrect to say otherwise.”
On the rail fares increase, the DfT referred the Standard back to its response when the rail fare increase was announced last December.
Then it noted that the increase was 6.4 percentage points lower than RPI inflation figure on which the annual hike is usually based.
At the time, Transport Secretary Mark Harper said he was “capping the rise well below inflation to help reduce the impact on passengers”.
He added: “It has been a difficult year and the impact of inflation is being felt across the UK economy. We do not want to add to the problem. This is a fair balance between the passengers who use our trains and the taxpayers who help pay for them.”
