{"id":35239,"date":"2026-06-20T22:48:14","date_gmt":"2026-06-20T22:48:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/35239\/"},"modified":"2026-06-20T22:48:14","modified_gmt":"2026-06-20T22:48:14","slug":"melbourne-commuters-now-able-to-use-ticketless-travel-on-trams","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/35239\/","title":{"rendered":"Melbourne commuters now able to use ticketless travel on trams"},"content":{"rendered":"

Melbourne commuters will be able to use their credit card, phone or smartwatch across the tram network from today after ticketless travel launched on trains this month following repeated delays.<\/p>\n

Buses will get the capability next month, but the Victorian government is yet to nominate a date. Concession passengers will also need to wait until next year.<\/p>\n

The state in 2023 awarded a $1.7 billion contract to overhaul myki<\/a>, but the program was hit by delays and cost blowouts.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Melbourne has fallen well behind Sydney and other international cities in enabling credit card payments instead of tickets or passes on public transport.<\/p>\n

Trials were due to begin in 2024 but started a year later on just four bus routes in Wangaratta.<\/p>\n

\"Green<\/p>\n

Melbourne has lagged cities including Sydney and London in allowing commuters to use their credit cards on public transport. (Source: Yarra Trams)<\/p>\n

Two Melbourne train lines began trialling the functionality in March. This was interrupted by free public transport in April and May, which threatened to delay the rollout.<\/a><\/p>\n

The cost-of-living measure, introduced when petrol prices soared as a result of the United States-Israel war on Iran, was then replaced by half-price fares for the rest of the year.<\/p>\n

There have been more than 700,000 trips using tap-and-go technology since the start of June, when the rest of the train network got the capability in stages.<\/p>\n

Regional stations that still rely on paper tickets will get the technology later this year. This month’s rollout on trains was for all myki-enabled train stations covering the Metro Trains network and some regional V\/Line stations.<\/p>\n

\"Man<\/p>\n

The myki ticketing system was introduced by the Brumby government in the late 2000s. (ABC News)<\/p>\n

Public Transport Minister Gabrielle Williams said four of five tap-and-go trips so far were made with a phone or smartwatch.<\/p>\n

“From today, you can step off a train and straight onto a tram using the same phone, watch or bank card,” she said.<\/p>\n

The Public Transport Users Association has called on the government to introduce a weekly tap-and-go cap that matches the cost of a weekly myki pass, so that daily commuters are not inadvertently overcharged.<\/p>\n

Shadow transport spokesman Matthew Guy this month said the government should not be celebrating something that should have happened a decade ago.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Melbourne commuters will be able to use their credit card, phone or smartwatch across the tram network from…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":35240,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[8657,260,23934,1093,23940,5002,2744],"class_list":["post-35239","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-melbourne","tag-credit-card","tag-melbourne","tag-myki","tag-public-transport","tag-smartwatch","tag-tram","tag-vline"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35239","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=35239"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35239\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/35240"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=35239"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=35239"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=35239"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}