[Moved from SE23 Topics > Jumping the barriers at HOP station]
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Just for a little bit of balance:

-it wasn't that long ago that HOP had no barriers at all

-Transport in London is hugely expensive: I work full time at an admittedly not well paid job, and I pay 1/6 of my earnings to travel into town on a packed cattle truck train and tube.

The public through taxes pays 4 times more (adjusted for inflation) to subsidised privatised train companies than when the trains were nationalised (according to the national authority on trains, Christian Wolmar).

Operators are making huge profits off ticket prices, every year putting up double inflation fair increases. I resent these operators making huge profits for a public service: its them stealing my money, not the odd poor kid jumping a barrier.

- I dont know if anyone here has lived/lives on minimum wage or on the dole, but in this day and age you get priced out travel.

-traveling with no fare is stressful and difficult - you may dodge something here and jump something there, but if you're doing it regularly you regularly get caught, especially at bigger stations. I've travelled with no fare in the past (at a time when it was easier, pre-oyster), and it was out of necessity to make ends meet.