London Region PAYG Contact Extensions for Rail ("Project Oval")--rail fare pro's and con's.

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Kicking off a ongoing thread to track and discuss the pro's and con's of London Region PAYG travel using contactless, as further expansions are starting again (under the name "Project Oval").

There is a plan to enable more stations this year (2024) under phase 1.

Note this is payment card contactless/mobile wallet contactless payments, not Oyster (which technically cannot be further expanded to cover additional zones), and therefore also not Freedom Passes, Zip Cards.

MilesT6060842

Last week Chiltern Railways enabled stations on High Wycombe route (as far as Denham).

Lifting an update from the excellent oysterfares.com blog/forum which has a lot of detailed discussion of when contactless PAYG is a good option, and when traditional paper Travelcards are still the better option 

Chiltern Railways activated their part of Oval phase 1. PAYG contactless now covers High Wycombe, Beaconsfield, Gerrards Cross, Denham Golf Club and Denham. TfL has this in their single fare finder’s database