Rail ticket office closures would cut out a vital service - GP Taylor

I sometimes shop online and in no way am I a fuddy-duddy.

Yet, the idea that I may never again be able to buy a train ticket from a ticket office leaves me seething with anger.

Pre Covid, I was a regular train user, even though I thought the tickets were way overpriced. The ticket office at Scarborough station was always a hive of activity. I found the staff there incredibly helpful.

They would often find me the best tickets at a great price and advise me on line closures and any problems I might face. It was a good, old-fashioned way of getting from A to B with a little help from someone with a lot of knowledge. The lights of the ticket office were a welcome sight at 5.30 in the morning when you catch the first train out of town.

Booking the ticket, chatting to the attendant was part of the journey. It was that little bit of human interaction that turned a trip by train into an adventure.

All that is about to change. Planned closures of ticket offices would see paper tickets phased out.

All of the 980 ticket offices would be closed forcing passengers to book online in order to save up to £500m a year for the rail companies.

It is highly unlikely that this saving will be passed on to travellers. Everyone will be forced to use smartphones and computers to book, even though this kind of technology breaks down and could easily be hacked by a foreign power or internet thieves.

The closures are likely to be a concern for older people who may struggle to use digital devices and the internet and might not have a smartphone. Age UK said around three million people over the age of 65 don’t have internet access. That is a lot of potential customers unable to access a ticket.

Not everybody, me included, wants to buy a ticket online. Railway websites are often not the easiest to navigate. Telephone back-up is often non-existent.

If I find it fraught with complications, what about the person who is less computer savvy?

Closing ticket offices is an attack on British culture. They have been part of the fabric of our nation since the film Brief Encounter.

Old fashioned doesn’t have to mean something is bad.

However, I really do believe that all of this is part of the breakdown of modern society. Everyone is being forced in to less and less face-to-face contact when shopping or parking the car.

Websites and apps are turning the country into a cashless society.

The more things go online, the more privacy we lose as we can be tracked in everything we do.

That is not a conspiracy theory, it is a fact.

Travel information from mobiles phones was used by the Government during the first lockdown to see if it was being complied with. Data companies regularly harvest and then sell on information about us from internet and phone usage.

Regardless of the privacy issue, the closing of ticket offices is just another step towards social isolation for many people. Like self-service checkouts and cashless car parks, another opportunity for conversation and interaction with another human being is taken away.

Just look around at all the phone zombies walking down the street, sitting in parks and on buses staring into their smartphones. Statistics indicate that many people pick up their phones and check them every 8.6 minutes with the average time spent online at over four hours per day – a shocking total of over 60 days a year.

It is a scientific fact that extended smartphone and computer use is very bad for our mental and physical health. As people get wise to the dangers of smoking, they all get addicted to smartphones.

Government needs to intervene now and stop the closure of ticket offices. Our society needs more and more opportunities for interaction and not less.

It will be a tragedy for us all if we are left at the whim of an internet booking site or ticket vending machine.

When the power goes out – for surely it will, what will happen then?

Railway stations need to have staff present for safety and security. Ticket office personnel already provide that duty.

Railways are the lifeblood of the country and should be in state ownership. Then and only then will the rail user be put first and our valued ticket offices stay open.