[Colm Moore]

http://www.herald.ie/news/smartcard-...e-2960878.html

Smartcard Leaps into action - 10 years late
By Cormac Murphy
Monday December 12 2011

COMMUTING just got a whole lot easier today as Dublin's long-awaited public transport smart card went on sale.

The Leap card allows passengers to use a variety of transport modes with the same pass.

Passengers can now hop on Dublin Bus, Luas, Dart and commuter rail services around the capital without having to buy separate tickets.

Use of the card costs at least 9pc less than if customers were to pay with cash.

Chief executive of the National Transport Authority (NTA), Gerry Murphy, assured commuters that their existing annual and monthly tickets will continue to work as normal.

The card has been in the pipeline for more than a decade and has cost more than €55m.

It is expected the scheme will be extended to include Bus Eireann services by summer 2012 and, subsequently, Iarnrod Eireann's mainline services.


Commuters

Commuters can buy the cards at a variety of outlets and top them up when required, similar to London's Oyster cards.

It works by commuters pre-paying for their journeys and waving the cards at magnetic readers for each trip.

The NTA said that the 'Leap' name was chosen to convey the ease with which commuters would move between public transport operators.

The passes can be ordered through www.leapcard.ie, which also contains detailed information about the system.

It comes after the NTA gave the green light for across-the-board fare increases on public transport services in January.

Meanwhile, Iarnrod Eireann implemented a 50pc increase from €2 to €3 in daily parking charges at its railway station car parks from today. The weekly fee of €8 went up to €10.

The €7 daily parking rate at Heuston, Connolly and Cork stations went up to €8.

However, the €30 monthly charge remained unchanged.

- Cormac Murphy