Buses in South London allow front boarding again as transport continues return to normality

All London buses are now taking payments after enhanced safety measures were installed across the fleet to protect drivers and customers from coronavirus.

Customers can now touch in with Oyster, contactless and concessionary cards on all buses, entering through the front doors on most buses in a near complete return to traditional front-door boarding arrangements.

The reintroduction of revenue collection and front-door boarding began in late May.

This came after analysis from University College London’s (UCL) Centre for Transport Studies and Department of Civil, Environmental & Geomatic Engineering found the protective measures TfL had introduced, including sealing off gaps in the driver’s assault screen, significantly reduced the risk to drivers of contracting coronavirus from customers.

The installation of additional safety measures across the bus fleet has allowed a full return to revenue collection and near complete return to front-door boarding.

A huge range of cleaning and hygiene measures have also been introduced across the transport network to make it cleaner than ever before.

Other safety measures include the wearing of face coverings.

Customers must wear a face covering that covers their nose and mouth for their entire journey, unless they are exempt.

Customers should not be taking the masks off mid-journey and the police and TfL’s enforcement officers are patrolling the transport network to ensure that everyone is following the rules, which are needed to help control the spread of the virus.

Already more than 10,000 people have been stopped from travelling without a face covering.