Cost of commuting

DD commutes. Great salary for young person but cost is high. It’s hybrid (3 days in office) but the 6 month probabtion is 5 days a week in office. So it’s extortionate. She’s holding on for probabtion end but couldn’t sustain this.
We pick up and drop off at station as they want £12 a day to park! Can’t park anywhere near station for parking restrictions. It really needs an overhaul.

To the person suggesting you park in a side street and walk - for a start you've already mentioned the restrictions, and secondly this is incredibly annoying for residents of the actual street. Surely when you move somewhere you factor these costs in? Mine is around £25 a day plus an extra £6 for the tube part. But being walkable to the station was (almost) the only absolute must-have when we bought.

We Pay an extortionate amount to live in central-ish Edinburgh so we can walk to work. We prefer this as it lets us see our kids too. When people can’t afford to live near where they work it damages their family life and leads to parents being exhausted.

The high house's prices in the UK damage our nation in so many ways. It’s disgusting.

Yes, but when I was growing up in Stockport the roads in the morning were just as bad as London, and that was in the late 1980s/1990s. Hate to think what it's like now. And you have Northern Trains who are an absolute shitshow. I much prefer my Kent to Charing X commute and actually enjoy it, albeit I've never done it five days a week.

i was in Manchester recently and Andy Burnham has done an amazing job dealing with the costs and reliability of public transport.

Having grown up in London and now living in the north, there is no way you could persuade me to move back down south, those prices are insane!

Same from Suffolk/Norfolk

Privatised rail…

Hour and ten here to get into Liverpool Street or an hour into Stratford. £90 return per day plus parking (though I cycle to the station which may be worth looking at).

No, it's crazy, though my commuting costs have gone down as I only go in two days a week and enjoy that balance.

£8 per day to park, £12.5k annual season ticket 🤢 for an hours journey into Euston! There’s a reason I don’t do it…

I am from Kent as well and it’s extortionate. I’ve luckily been able to go in a bit later recently meaning I swerve the peak travel costs!!

£95 per day - 50 miles exactly from London. It is much cheaper after 9.30am.

I live 9 miles outside of the centre of a big northern city, there is 1 bus service for my village and only 1 bus that can get me into work on time, that’s if it is running and it fills up so it’s miserable.

I drive in now, but have to leave at 7am as there is nowhere to park in town so you have to get there super early, in order to get a spot in one of the £20 a day parking multi stories. Honestly when I get there today at around half 7 there will be a queue. There are some park and rides dotted about, but to get to most of them I have to drive past my place of work, or drive miles and miles in the opposite direction 🤦‍♀️

Its infuriating. There are a couple of train stations but all around 4 miles from my house, again parking is £15 a day, plus the £100+ a month train ticket and the 40 minutes extra time added to my commute.

Thankfully I can do most of my work remotely but I do miss going in to the office and having a social life. I switched jobs during covid and used to work in a business park off the motorway- the commute was awful but parking was free!

Luxembourg has free public transport for all (but very high taxes).

I used to pay €1650 per year for the DART commuter train to get 12 miles from the suburbs to city centre in Dublin as a tax free ticket through a work scheme, and €800 annually for parking at the station up to 2023.

In Brussels, I pay €1.89 per journey (because I top up my ticket with 10 journeys for €18.90) on public transport - which can include changing lines in that journey. Most places are within walking distance of a public transport line and they are well connected and easy to manage journeys to most other places so there is far less need to drive for commuting.

Mine’s about £59 return + £15 parking. Also from Kent - wonder if we take the same train I’m just a few stops less than you 😂

£37 for a 45 minute journey direct to London bridge 🫠

£47 into London per day here (peak). It’s a 50 minute train. Absolute extortion and I have no idea why we need to pay above inflation rises each year. Is it because of privatisation that we can’t have a functioning service at a reasonable price? This country is mad. We cannot get the basics right at all.

Trains are disgustingly expensive and disgustingly unreliable. DP is looking at a job in London where he would go twice a week. £6k in train fares plus around £10 a day parking or I could drop him but would need to plan around. This is if the trains are on not cancelled or delayed - in the last 2 years I have not been on a train that wasn’t cancelled or delayed. Ex Colleague lived in MK and her husband paid £7-8k to travel to London daily prior to covid.

I live 6 miles from a city centre - big city. It’s £7 to park all day and £7.50 return on the train. The cost has nearly doubled in the 10 years I’ve worked at my company. My wages have not doubled. It’s not so much the cost as on the face of it £15 per day doesn’t seem like a lot it’s the fact that it’s increased and continues to increase above wage inflation

My son pays £250 commuting into London a month and I don’t think it’s too bad (could use that 7 days and he does often travel into the city on the weekend for fun!). We are on edge of zone 6. Parking is obviously extra, but he walks 25 mins each way to the station. Can you not park in a side street and walk?

Do agree that London weighting doesn’t cover extra cost of living in the south east. I have done 25yrs here and finally heading back north next year when youngest child finishes 6th form so I can buy a house as single income doesn’t go far here. Will still have commuting costs as not going to be mega close to the office. I go in 5 days at moment out of choice but will be less as further away when I move.

>£100 a day plus £12 to park. Exactly an hour from London on a very popular commuter line into waterloo. Although it was less with an annual ticket.

When covid happened, we saved all the money and bought all new blinds and curtains for our house! Annual ticket then was £7500

I am in Perth, Australia, fares are currently capped at two zones which is a max of $10.40 a day (about a fiver). In January the cap is being reduced to one zone so the max cost will be about $5, or 2 pounds fifty per day. Travel is free on Sundays, and if you travel off peak FamilyRider ticket costs $10.40 to cover 2 adults and up to five kids. Perth is the longest city in the world (about 170 km) and this covers the whole area. I used to commute in London back in the 90s and 00s, it was expensive enough but affordable. I was back for a holiday in August and was totally shocked by how expensive public transport is now in the UK!

I live in a European capital. Transport costs are very affordable and it is the norm for employers to pay or contribute towards for a season ticket. Mine pay 100% so commuting costs me zero. We pay high taxes here but railway is government owned and therefore subsided. There are discounts for students and I think it cost €35 for my daughter for 3 months to commute 35 mins into the city. Tram and metro is €12 per year!!!

It’s less than £50 for a travel card for an entire week in many European capital cities. Uk public transport is a rip off.

That’s insane, in Sydney there is a weekly public transport cap of $50 (so £25). You can travel from hours away and still be covered.