Could some of London’s problems be solved by free travel?
It might not be a silver bullet, but free travel campaigners have cranked up the pressure by calling for universal free public transport for all ages in the UK and London.
Londoners have been bogged down by the rising cost of travel, coupled with the high prices of everything from food to housing.
Each year, people have to dish out more and more on Tube and rail tickets just to get to work. Many are spending a chunk of their wages on travel on boiling hot carriages, while brazen fare dodgers irritate paying commuters.
In March, Underground, Overground, Elizabeth line and DLR fares went up by 4.6% along with National Rail tickets, which was above the rate of inflation.
Tube travel increased by 10p or 20p, depending on the ticket type, zone and travel time. A single contactless or Oyster journey now costs between £2.50 to £3.80.
Future fare increases are set to be above the rate of inflation, it is feared as the UK Retail Price Index (RPI)
With the bleak outlook for passengers’ wallets, campaigners from Fare Free London have renewed calls for universal free travel for everyone, including in London, to cut inequality and pollution, and to follow in the footsteps of other smaller European cities and countries.
How could free travel help?
Simon Pirani from Fare Free London told Metro the cost of travel in London is ‘unsustainable’ for poor families.
Introducing universal free travel would help reduce inequality, car use and pollution, and social isolation, Fare Free London says.
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He said: ‘The Underground network is the best publicly owned network in the country, but it is extremely expensive.
‘We now have the funding settlement between the mayor and the government, which agrees on fare increase above inflation for four years.
‘The situation for low-income families is unsustainable. The Tube is too expensive, and that funding settlement suggests that there will also be a rise in bus fares, which have been frozen until now.’
He called for the funding model between Transport for London and the government to be changed to make it less reliant on fare income, like in Paris and New York City, and for the Mayor to set up a commission to look into the free travel option.
‘It is about getting back to the idea of public services, for the state to provide a service. Transport system should not be there to make anyone loads of money, it should be there to provide the service people need,’ Simon said.
Free travel would help address ‘social injustice, which we definitely have in London’ and take cars off roads.
‘People don’t travel to places because they can’t afford it,’ he added.
Around 26% of Londoners – or 2.3 million people – are living in poverty, the latest figures from the Trust for London show, driven by high cost of housing. Of working-age adults, 23% lived in poverty in 2023-24, while 22% of pensioners were struggling.
Who already gets free travel in London?
One of the people who has benefited from free travel that is already available in London is Peter Henderson.
The 68-year-old, who works as a youth mental health carer, will have to work for the foreseeable future due to his low pension, and he relies on the 60+ Oyster card that gives him free travel in London after 9am.
He told Metro that without the 60+ Oyster card discount, he would be ‘up the s*** creek’ and struggling to get to work. Working mostly night shifts, Peter still has to pay for coming back from work as 60+ free travel only starts after 9am.
The cost of applying for the discount cards like 60+ Oyster increased this summer.
Children up to the age of 10 also travel for free in London and on trains, butyoung adults tend to fall in between, many of whom are locked in low-paying and precarious jobs and struggling to make ends meet.
In the UK, around 1.9 million low-income households had skipped essential travel last year due to costs, Maudie Johnson-Hunter, an economist with the Joseph Rowntree Foundation, told Metro.
‘A quarter of families on Universal Credit had been unable to make an essential journey. Low-income families with a Black respondent, three in ten had been unable to make an essential journey,’ she said.
She said that evidence shows that when out-of-work benefits are too low, many jobseekers cannot afford to travel to interviews or work.
‘If you cannot afford to travel, that can really limit what you can do in your community and society, and impact your ability to see friends and family, and get to essential services,’ she added.
A spokesperson for the Mayor of London Sadiq Khan said he is ‘continually looking into new innovative ways to keep London transport as affordable as possible.’
‘The Mayor has worked hard to keep TfL fares fair and affordable for Londoners, whether through freezing TfL fares for five years, introducing the Hopper bus fare, or freezing bus and tram fares for the sixth time since 2016,’ they said.’
What cities offer free travel?
Many countries and cities have put the UK to shame with their transport system, and you don’t have to travel further than Ireland to find more free travel than the UK.
People aged 66 and over can travel for free on most buses, the Dublin public transport, the Irish Rail (Iarnród Éireann) and some private ferry services as part of the Free Travel Scheme.
And the free Irish travel offer is not a new creation – it has been around since 1967.
From September, everyone aged 70 and over will get free travel for themselves and a companion in the Republic of Ireland. Children aged five to eight will also get free travel soon, the Irish government announced in its 2025 budget.
In France, at least three cities have free travel, with Montpellier offering free bus and tram for half a million people, while Dunkirk has free bus for both residents and visitors, although London dwarfs all of the cities and countries where free travel already exists.
But Simon from Fare Free London insists that free travel is possible in London despite the city’s size.
He said: ‘It is increasingly being done in large cities across the world. We now have Luxembourg, Malta and Tallinn. There is no reason why it cannot be done in the city the size of London.
‘Trying it in a city of 10 million plus people would be something new, but as for shifting the [TfL] funding model, that is possible.
‘Of course planning transport networks is complicated.
‘But free travel is entirely realistic.’
So how realistic is free travel in London?
In short, there are no plans to actually roll out free universal travel.
If everyone stopped paying for travel in London tomorrow, it would leave TfL with a hole of around £5.7 billion in estimated passenger fare income in 2025-26.
This money would have to come from elsewhere, like taxes.
Free transport would likely lead to more passengers and use of infrastructure, and in turn, higher maintenance costs, it is understood.
Steps are being taken towards some free public transport.
People aged under 22 in England could get free bus travel in the future if plans proposed by the Transport Select Committee go ahead, which is already done in Scotland.
Metro approached TfL, the London Mayor and the Department for Transport for a comment.
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