“I’ve worked in computers all my life but I find these machines really difficult to use,” said 73-year-old Adrian Bennett, explaining why he will always buy a train ticket from a human being if he can.
“I just can’t be bothered with them and if there is someone I can actually speak to then I will. I think you pay more money if you use a machine. It is a lot of hassle, a lot of aggravation and they should definitely keep the ticket offices.”
Bennett was getting a train from Darlington to his home in south Wales. He’s getting on but he’s tech-savvy. “I can use the machines. I understand them. But it’s not a nice feeling when you start using the damn thing. It’s not like talking to someone.”
He may have to start using them all of the time if a plan to close almost every ticket office in England goes ahead. That would include the ticket office at Darlington, a town steeped in railway history. It was here that the Stockton to Darlington railway line, dating from 1825, became the first passenger railway in the world to use steam trains.
Among the trains to run on it was Locomotion No 1, built by the pioneering engineers George and Robert Stephenson. Four years later Robert Stephenson created the Rocket, a world-changer and arguably the most famous of all early locomotives.
Everyone in Darlington seems to know its place in railway history and the pride is obvious. No one who the Guardian talked to at the town’s magnificent grade II*-listed railway station thought closing ticket offices was a good idea.
Pauline Skerrett, 83, lives in Newton Aycliffe and travels regularly to Saltburn to see her friend. She could do the whole journey by train but can’t use the ticket machines at Newton Aycliffe. So she gets a bus to Darlington to buy a rail ticket to Saltburn from a human.
“I think closing the ticket offices is disgusting,” she said. “I’m a pensioner and I only have a basic phone. I can just dial and send texts, that’s all. I don’t have a credit card.
“The people in the ticket office are always lovely, really helpful. It’s mad to close them but everything is going mad, isn’t it?”
There was a constant stream of people using the two open booths at the ticket office when the Guardian visited, even though it was quieter than normal with an overtime ban by Aslef leading to cancellations.
And it was not just elderly people in the queue. Maisie Mitford and Paula Motiejunaite are both 16-year-old students. “Our train just got cancelled so we went to the ticket office because we’re not really sure what we had to do,” said Motiejunaite. “If they hadn’t have helped, we wouldn’t know what to do.”
Both were against closure. “I don’t think they should close because there will be older people who don’t want to do all the online stuff. There’s nothing like talking to someone face to face.”
Steve Phoenix and his partner, Pamela Thomas, are on their way to London for the Blur gig at Wembley. They also use the ticket office. “We do everything online, which is great, but sometimes you do need to speak to someone,” said Thomas.
They had been unable to book seats on the return train so wanted to talk to someone in the ticket office. Phoenix said: “I spent a lot of time using trains when I was in the forces and a lot of time going into ticket offices trying to get the best connections and the best routes home from wherever it was. You can’t do that with a machine.
“Having someone in a ticket office, able to give you the information you need, is vital.”
The announcement of mass ticket office closures, for which there will be a formal three-week consultation process, has angered disability and passenger groups as well as unions and MPs. That anger was also obvious among passengers.
“Closing the ticket offices would be a disaster for me,” said Brian Hunter, a retired teacher. “I’m over 80 and I don’t find digital devices easy to use. I’ve got to ask my grandson if I want to use an app so, yes, I will be disappointed if they close them.”
He has used the ticket machines in the past travelling to Newcastle and York “but they often didn’t work so it was just easier to go in to the ticket office.
“If I’m going to Aberystwyth, how the hell do I work out how to get there? And how would I get my tickets? It is ridiculous. They should not be closing them.”
