A+B+C my $%*&, take me to Central

After praise for the BBC it’s rant time again I’m afraid.

I took a trip to Durham to get my passport renewed – it was full after just over four years, so I made sure I asked for a Jumbo one this time – and took the opportunity to take a few photos while I was there.

I was very impressed that the new passport arrived by courier the next day, even though I’d “only” paid for the one week service.

But the subject of the rant is from the very start of the trip, when I arrived at the local Metro station to find that the ticket machines had been upgraded.

The Metro is a damn good local rail service, but it’s had the same ticket machines (I think) since it opened in the 1980s, and with fares now approaching £5 it really was about time the machines took something other than coins, especially as they frequently rejected them, closing the slot for a few seconds after each rejection just to make absolutely sure you missed your train.

But they’re history. No, it’s the new machines that did my head in.

The concept of Zoned destinations is pretty universal, I think, but usually you just look at the Zone your destination station is in and buy a ticket for that zone – let’s say A, B or C shall we.

Stations on the Metro are in Zones, you guessed it A, B  and C. Zone A appears to be the central area, and my station Monkseaton is in Zone C.

Simple enough, you’d have thought, but for some reason the new ticket machines at Monkseaton offer you  tickets to Zone C, Zones B + C,  or Zones  A + B + C.

Whaaaaaaaaaaaat ???

Just look at the bloody thing … I’m convinced that the first few times people use them they’ll be scratching their heads just like I was.

Yes we’ll get used to it, but the only reason I can think of for printing so many zones on the damn things is to cover the offchance that someone buying a ticket for Zone A thinks they’re not allowed to get off the train until they reached there.

“Duh, my ticket’s for Zone A so I can’t get off early at Benton because that’s in Zone B”.

And, like you, I can’t believe I’ve just done a rant over something so trivial …