THERE is a fundamental hurdle that any public transport scheme always struggles with as it tries to grow significantly – ease of use.

People will usually only review their travelling habits at two crucial points: when they move home or change jobs, although recent spikes in petrol are also causing many motorists to pause for thought at the moment.

A fundamental concern in that decision-making process is whether taking the bus or the train is going to be that much more of a hassle than slipping into your car.

So, the unifying of tickets across three of the city’s bus operators, Oxford, Stagecoach and Thames Travel, should hopefully help towards that aim.

It has been ridiculous, from a promotion of public transport-point of view at least, that passengers have to stand there and watch a bus head off to where they want to go but they can’t board because they have the wrong company’s ticket.

In terms of passenger satisfaction, you can see the same thing on our trains. Visitors to the city are told by First Great Western staff at Oxford they can hop on the next train, only to then be growled at by the Virgin ticket inspector onboard and probably made to pay another fare.

Hopefully, there will not be any teething problems and the single ticketing will be seen as one of the day’s this city’s transport system took a huge step forward.