Time for a good old-fashioned spleen vent.
Heathrow Express is frighteningly expensive. A return nowadays sets you back £29, which is almost £1 a minute. At peak times there’s substantial demand for the service which whisks you from Heathrow into central London in 15 minutes every 15 minutes. The trouble is when that “whisking” is more like “lightly stirring” and the train is delayed. Last night we were stuck at Ealing Broadway for 4-5 minutes. Nothing in the grand scheme of things, but at the prices the HExp charges it suddenly seems like a lot.
Economics aside, it would seem to make sense to operate a more structured fare scale so that the business passengers who use it early morning and mid-evening get stung for the £29 (and charge it back) but “off-peak” it’s noticeably cheaper so the poor unsuspecting tourists who don’t realise quite how expensive it is don’t have a horrible shock when they first experience “London prices”.
Spleen vent over.