First Great Western
Train operators with London services are slowly adopting Oyster technology

First Great Western adopts Oyster

Train operator benefits from TfL's further investment in IT

Written by Angelica Mari

Train operator First Great Western has installed Oyster readers from West Drayton and Greenford into Paddington to allow commuters to use Transport for London's pay-as-you-go ticketing system.

The move follows an agreement announced in May by London mayor Boris Johnson between TfL and First Great Western, which will see the extension of Oyster pay-as-you-go to all London stations.

Following in the footsteps of his predecessor Ken Livingstone, Johnson will pour further investment into Oyster technology.

"Transport for London is investing £40m in new Oyster equipment and I will shortly be meeting with the other train operating companies to urge them to get onboard and make Oyster available to all Londoners," said Johnson.

Livingstone had already offered £20m to train firms last year to help fund integration with the London smartcard scheme by the 2009 deadline.

But fewer than half of the 10 firms running train services into London are ready to offer smartcard ticketing to customers.

Current operators using Oyster are Chiltern, C2C, National Express East Anglia on their Hackney area services, and Southern between Clapham Junction and Watford Junction.

reader comments

related articles

Oyster cardPublic Sector

Mixed reaction to decision by TfL to end Oyster contract

Transport for London cuts its ties with the TranSys consortium and begins plans for its replacement 21 Aug 2008

 

Contactless payment gets ready for London 2012

Mobile payment trial is a success 11 Sep 2008

Oyster card system suffers weekend crash

More than 40,000 travel cards get corrupted and commuters travelled for free on Saturday due to system failure 14 Jul 2008

National smartcard scheme arrives

But MPs highlight integration challenges for buses and question whether the rail industry is ready 01 Apr 2008

TfL terminates Oyster IT contract

Consortium including EDS and Cubic is shown the door to generate savings 11 Aug 2008

Government demands Oyster cards conform to UK standards

Department for Transport stresses the importance of ITSO smartcard compliance in London 17 Jun 2008

Boris performs fuel cell U-turn

As criticism of his environmental record mounts, London's mayor announces plans to scale back proposed fuel cell trials 07 Aug 2008

Government demands Oyster cards conform to UK standards

Department for Transport stresses the importance of ITSO smartcard compliance in London 17 Jun 2008

Livingstone ups ante over £25 congestion charge

Mayor aims to position environment as key battleground in election fight 31 Jan 2008

related whitepapers

today's top stories

IT's stock is soaring at the LSE

London Stock Exchange IT chief David Lester explains to Angelica Mari how the integration of Borsa Italiana is keeping his team busy, despite the worsening economy 20 Nov 2008

Keeping IT in fashion

John Bovill has been hooked on retail since his early years as a fashion market trader. His industry knowledge is now helping him build a slick IT operation, reports Charlotte Moore 20 Nov 2008

Cutting-edge IT delivers the goods

Chief technology officer Jay Bregman explains how constant innovation is part and parcel of his strategy for delivering competitive advantage at eCourier 20 Nov 2008

Computing podcast: Europol's data sharing woes; credit card protection at Cotton Traders

The pan-European fight against organised crime is undermined by lax data sharing arrangements; and Cotton Traders enhances its credit card protection 20 Nov 2008

Keeping IT on track

Catherine Doran, winner of Computing’s IT Leader of the Year award, tells Angelica Mari of her determination to drive on with technology-led transformation at Network Rail despite uncertainty over funding 19 Nov 2008

Advertisement

Newsletter signup

Sign up for our range of FREE newsletters:

Existing User

Newsletter user login:

Advertisement

Jobs

Related jobs

Job of the week

Job alerts

Sign up here

Find your next job

IT Salary Checker

Check salary here

Advertisement

White papers

Search white papers

Top categories

VPN, Extranet and Intranet Solutions

WAN/ LAN Solutions

Network Security

Interoperability-Connectivity

Grid/ Utility Computing

Latest poll

Will attempts to rebrand IT as a "cool" choice of profession increase the number of IT graduates?

Will attempts to rebrand IT as a "cool" choice of profession increase the number of IT graduates?

Can brand building reverse a decline in IT graduate numbers?

Previous poll results

Latest audio and video articles

Video

The definitive guide to converged communications

Five key trends and five best practice tips to help you improve your corporate communications 20 Nov 2008

PodcastAudio

Computing podcast: Europol's data sharing woes; credit card protection at Cotton Traders

The pan-European fight against organised crime is undermined by lax data sharing arrangements; and Cotton Traders enhances its credit card protection 20 Nov 2008

Latest in-depth articles

StarFeatures

Retaining the stars of IT

Jim Mortleman investigates the innovative techniques IT leaders are using to hang on to their star performers 20 Nov 2008

Dave BaileyComment

Clouds darken outlook for Vista's successor

Windows 7 looks like being an improvement on Vista, but economic and environmental concerns may mean few enterprises will rush to adopt it 20 Nov 2008

Advertisement

Primary Navigation