Courtesy of “Akarana” on the Campaign for Better Transport forum, we may have our first look at what the “proper” HOP card will look like when it’s (eventually) implemented some time later this year (or later this decade, judging by how the project has progressed so far). This picture was snapped at Greenlane station – showing a testing screen for where you can top up your card or buy a single ride:
I may be reading a bit too much into this, but quite obviously the card in the image above looks very different to our current HOP cards. This suggests that AT recognise the association of the current HOP card with Snapper has damaged the brand and are looking to create something that’s very very different. They’re also promoting the “AT” brand much more, which I think is sensible.
The next real question is whether Snapper can make their machines compatible with this card and with the Thales system. November 30 is creeping up on us, the date when presumably heads start to roll if NZ Bus hasn’t hooked into the Thales system yet.
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If you look at the AT logo from that angle it looks a bit like a trail of how we got here so far.
That is, The A has Up and Down (or Zig Zag if you look it sideways) parts, Then the T is straight run to a perpendicular road, where you have to go either left or right.
Kind of sums up the decisions that AC and AT are about to face doesn’t it in a completely unintentional way don’t you think?
I thought BTW that logos like AT were supposed to be used in conjunction with the AC logo and the words “An Auckland Council Organisation” or something similar.
No evidence of either of those on that image – Bad AT!.
Mind you now wondering if maybe a picture of a Turkey mightn’t be more apt for HOP and AT.
Cant see them rebranding. Big waste of money if they do.
Plus isn’t HOP meant to work nation wide? Branding it AT will cause confustion when you go to use it in Wellington/CHCH
since whenis HOP meant to work nationwide?its planned for use exclusively in jafaland.
I believe when the NZTA took over the tendering process they did it with nationwide implementation in mind.
I would like to see it is Wellington too, but Snapper is pretty entrenched there.
The core system is designed for use nationwide however any region wanting to roll out integrated ticketing will put their own brand and structure on top of it. The individual regions would also own their own floats. So HOP is Auckland only but the technology behind it is the same as what would be rolled out elsewhere. Any form of inter compatibility would have to come from agreements between council around transferring of float balances (when using stored value outside the cards home region).
As for Wellington, yes snapper is pretty well established but only on some operators. Part of the reason for the NZTA taking over the core system was they didn’t want to have to fund a different system for each region when the others eventually pushed for integrated ticketing. One of the requirements is that the regions use the NZTA core so that will force some interesting changes/discussions for Wellington when that happens.
Lol. I’d bet this was done by some graphic designer asked by his boss to quickly whip up a stand-in image (and I think he’she did a reasonable job of that). Don’t put too much meaning on this…
Please, no.. not that horrible AT logo. I also think (or hope) it’s just a generic graphic.
Would have thought they retain the current purple HOP branding but just drop the snapper fish.
The more I see that new AT logo the more I like it, actually.
The AT Gay Cat logo was designed to appeal to the aesthetic sensibilities of engineers. It’s pretty amazing that it can combine every feature that characterises bad design in one graphic statement. Some of these features can be quickly identified: it’s literal (really like the tunnel symbolism of the encompassing circle); over-complicated (quite how many colours you can squeeze into a symbol is amazing); retrogressive (its reference to the design of 1980s television logos is a wonderful example of unanticipated achronistic design); and it makes no connection to the fact that AT is a CCO of AC. Frankly, the best thing they could do would just be to rename the Hop card the Turkey card and hope that it doesn’t hold views about Christmas.
“Frankly, the best thing they could do would just be to rename the Hop card the Turkey card and hope that it doesn’t hold views about Christmas.”
How I lol’d.
My pet theory is there’s nothing accidental about the retro-ness of the logo – they’re hoping future visitors to Auckland don’t realise we’re only just getting the standard of public transit that most serious world cities had by the 1970s…
I personally don’t see anything wrong with the logo. Just a detail as far as I’m concerned. It’s a tiny bit similar to ATAF the public transport in Florence, Italy – http://www.ataf.net They mostly use buses, but have one tram or light rail line, and suburban trains. Their ticketing is based on time/duration not zones so it’s relatively easy to use. You don’t pay the driver, but use ticket machines on buses, though you can buy tickets from drivers but with the correct change I think so buses don’t wait for ages at bus stops. They have random inspectors too.
The only issue with the logo I have is whether AT should really be exerting its independence from Council so much. What’s wrong with the Pohutukawa flower?
That logo is what they call operational logo the corporate logo is still the Pohuntukawa flower my uniform now features both logos
Seriously there is nothing wrong with the logo. Could it be better, yes but at least it makes sense unlike this whole Maxx brand bs. Everything could be better, theres always room for improvement so Im sure no matter what it looked like some of you would still complain.
With “AT as the biggest words on the card, they run the risk that names like “AT Card” will become the used nomenclature,
it is called HOP so HOP should be the biggest writing on the card, AT can be in the corner like apparently “hop” is …
If you are going to promote the HOP brand, don’t drown it out with the AT brand,
if it’s for me I’d erase hop forever. It became hopeless, snapper became fishy. An old school acronym I think works better.
Only my opinion which means virtually nothing, but I quite like the simplicity and the link of the AT logo.
This is a photo somebody took of an electronic graphic on an computer screen, used to show people how to insert a card into a machine. It is also something that must have been done weeks or maybe even months ago.
The machines were running two different software versions. This is a newer build. The one at Greenlane seemed unfinished as it referred to the station by #113 (which is the station ID of Greenlane) rather than the user friendly station name which the other machines do.
I think I prefer the AT HOP card to the current one. But maybe that’s because the small Snapper logo puts me off the current one.
I wouldn’t jump to conclusions as of yet, this may just be there trail card until the proper system is rolled out. I can’t see them ditching HOP. Unless others have some inside info???
There is still the HOP brand on this pictured card, albeit smaller. But I agree, it is not something one can definitely judge yet.
What does the logo matter???????
For the same reasons it matters for Apple, Ford, McDonalds, London Underground etc – it represents something to the customer.
The new logo makes some sense whereas the MAXX nonsense stood for goodness knows what??
I am also a fan for the contracting parties painting their vehicles in Auckland coloured livery if allocated to regular timetable services as they are in London with a small portion in the company livery. I doubt if this would impress Birkenhead Transport though whose livery is similar to the old Birkenhead Borough………plus no hideous advertising bill boards all over buses, particularly over windows.
Lets smarten transport up. Look at Kiwirail compared to the old NZ Rail..Back in the 80’s their locomotives were 25% red and 75% muck and rust. I don’t think they ever saw a cleaner from one service to the next.