'You're not banging on about train tickets again are you'.
These were the words of my long-suffering wife as she heard me launching into an impassioned rant to some visiting friends this weekend about the limitations and frustrations of Merseyrail's ticketing system. She has put up with a lot of this chat to be fair, I'm not sure she imagined this was what marriage would be like.
If there is indeed a correlation between entering your early (to mid) thirties and caring passionately about public transport issues, then I am a classic of the genre. The truth is I have always found the Merseyrail network generally reliable, useful and even - dare I say it - enjoyable to travel on, but that network - and the people who use it - are being badly let down by a painfully outdated and impractical ticketing system.
READ MORE: Merseyrail fine over thetrainline ticket shows system is 'how not to welcome visitors'
Lo and behold, I had barely finished my rant when a glaring example of this ridiculous system pulled in to my proverbial station. I was copied into a number of tweets from former Labour MP and cabinet minister Sir David Hanson, who recounted a transport tale of frustration and woe, the type of which has become about as regular as a Merseyrail train itself (normal timetable permitting).
Mr Hanson explained that his youngest child, while on a trip to Liverpool, had been fined for not having their ticket printed off, despite having paid for it and despite being able to show that they had paid for it on their mobile phone. The ticket had been paid for on the third-party Trainline app for a journey from Chester, but because it had not been physically printed out (which would completely defeat the point of buying tickets on an app), the upset youngster was hit with a £20 fine.
It is painfully obvious to anyone that this is an entirely inadequate and unacceptable system for the major public transport network of a world famous tourist city like Liverpool. Sir David said the experience had 'spoiled a day out to a great city' and suggested others may be put off by similar experiences. And he is probably right.
We should be doing absolutely everything we can to encourage people to visit our city and region, which relies so heavily on a vibrant visitor economy that has been devastated over the past two years of lockdowns. We should also be doing absolutely everything we can to encourage everyone to ditch their cars and use public transport to get around this magnificent city region. If either of these ambitions are being curtailed by a comically out-of-date system, then that system needs to be replaced, so why hasn't it been?
I asked Merseyrail for an explanation as to why we haven't seen the upgrades that other cities and regions have. Responding, commercial director Suzanne Grant said: "Currently, we do not have the technology needed to validate electronic tickets, and unfortunately this opens the risk of a customer simply refunding their ticket once they have completed their journey. For this reason we cannot accept them.
She added: "We understand that the pandemic has accelerated demand for smarter ticketing options, and in January we introduced new systems to allow tickets purchased via third parties to be printed and collected at our stations. This is already proving popular and is the first stage in what we hope will be significant future improvements to our ticketing offer."
While talk of 'significant future improvements' is positive, there is no suggestion of timescales for these improvements and it is my understanding that significant funding will also be required. Its worth noting that while some other transport operators have had direct funding from government for these kind of upgrades, Merseyrail works under a different system where it is overseen by the transport arm of the Liverpool City Region.
For his part, Metro Mayor Steve Rotheram has been very vocal about his desire for a London-style integrated public transport system since his election to the role in 2017. Reacting to Sir David Hanson's account, Mayor Rotheram tweeted: "This is another symptom of our fragmented transport network. The London-style system I'm building isn't just about making our transport cheaper and more reliable, it's about improving ticketing too. It should be as simple as tap and go."
And he's right, the issues with our not-so-smart ticketing systems in Merseyside go way beyond third party payment rows. A few weeks ago I prompted something of a conversation on twitter when I posted an image of a long queue spiralling out of the door of St Michael's station during the morning rush. It's a scenes I see most mornings, with needlessly stressed commuters either missing their crucial morning train or hopping on in the hope that the staff member at the barrier at the other end will believe that a timely purchase was impossible. To be blunt, its bonkers.
Anyone who has spent time in London, Manchester or other major cities will have been able to use their bank cards to simply tap in and out of their public transport journeys at any time, to any destination and across any mode of public transport. It's a simple idea that has been in place elsewhere for quite a long time now, but looking at those morning queues we seem pretty far away from that right now.
So while its good to hear local leaders and transport bosses recognising the frustrations faced by passengers both here in the city region and those travelling in from further afield, it is high time we got a bit more detail about what those improvement plans are and, crucially, when they are going to happen.
The only thing I can guarantee is that this particular public transport bore will be continuing to press the case.
