A Couple More Transit Thoughts
With MetroLink events today (paid preview ride), this weekend (ribbon cutting & free rides) and Monday (new fares, revenue service on Cross County line) this is becoming an unofficial transit week here on Urban Review. I have some additional thoughts that I’ll toss out for discussion: Fare based on distance, not direction and a renewable transit debit card.
Distance Based Fares:
A person traveling a short distance on our light rail system, MetroLink, pays the same rate as the person traveling the full length. To the person traveling to the end of the system (Illinois, Lambert or now Shrewsbury) the fare is a bargain relative to travel time, fuel, parking and such. But the person going only one or two stations away the fare really sucks. For local travel the MetroLink is set up to be more regional in its approach and the fares reflect as much. But not all cities are this way.
In Washington D.C. and San Francisco, for example, their system charges you based on distance. You swipe your card as you enter the system and again as you leave. It deducts the rate from station to station. The greater the distance you travel the more you pay. For those that only travel one or two stations it really makes sense. The issue here is how to track the coming and going of everyone. In these examples they have more complicated stations and you must swipe your card to enter and leave the stations. This adds cost, lots of cost. When the original MetroLink system was being designed in the late 1980s and early 1990s a decision was made that we’d be on the honor system for payment, thus reducing the necessity to have costly limited access stations. Our stations, if you haven’t seen them, sell tickets which must be validated before boarding the train. Weekly and monthly passes are available and offer real value for those using the system often.
Transit Debit Card:
No, I’m not thinking of a Visa card with the Metro logo on it to show your support for transit when making a purchase a Target. Rather, one thing I like about the D.C. and San Francisco systems, among others, is the ability to buy a transit card with an amount such as $20. As I use the system the fare is deducted from the original balance. At any point I can go to a machine, check the balance and add more money to the card. As someone who rarely has more than $10 in their pockets this is really convenient. But, as described above, we have a ticket/honor system for our light rail. Currently transit officers randomly check passengers for a validated ticket or a weekly or monthly pass for the current period. How would my debit card work in this case?
We’d need some sort of device at the stations to swipe before boarding a train. Unlike the closed systems in other cities, this could just be on a platform and not be required to enter/exit. Officers checking tickets & passes would need some sort of hand-held device to swipe the transit card to ensure the holder swiped the card back at the station and thus “paid” the fare for that ride. To offer the “distance based fare” noted above, when the card holder swipes the card at the first station it assumes the full fare. But swipe it again upon arriving at a shorter station then you get a credit back for only using a portion of the system. But, this idea has a bigger upside.
The debit card could also work with MetroBus. Again, I seldom carry cash and I almost never have any coin in my pockets. I see stores near bus stops proclaiming “No change for bus” as they don’t want to break someone’s $5 bill or even give change for a buck. “Buy a monthly pass” some might say but for those of us that don’t or can’t use the system enough to justify a monthly pass we are left with exact change being our only option. The debit card would allow someone to put money on the card when they got paid and monitor their balance as they use the system. When it gets low they might add a few bucks or even that $5 to the card. As I noted in my previous post, if I ride the bus all semester it will cost me just over $50, less if I bike home sometimes. I would gladly put $50 on a card that could be used on the bus or light rail.
The obvious problem is where to sell the cards. It is easy to put such devices at MetroLink stations but we certainly can’t put one at the thousands of bus stops. This is where convenience stores earn their name — they could sell Metro cards along with all the other items they sell. Stores along popular bus routes might sell quite a few and it would let bus riders use their debit or credit card if they are short on cash. Once you’ve got the card you can simply add to it at a MetroLink station or one of the various bus transfer stations.
The other question becomes the existing card readers in the buses. They currently can note who has a valid weekly or monthly pass but it is unclear if they could be programed to both keep track of the fare paid for that bus route as well as subtract the amount from the holder’s card. Most likely they could not deduct the fare from the debit card. New card readers and the associated equipment in all the buses and at the stations may not be cost effective — the number of new riders to the system not justifying the capital expense.
The idea behind these concepts is to look at some new ways to get more people, like myself, that have several bikes a scooter and a new car to consider using transit. The more transit choice riders added to the system the better it can become for those that are transit dependent. Maybe these ideas have already been examined and rule out for any number of valid reasons?
Frequency and total travel time are probably the two biggest factors in determining whether someone takes transit or not. Beginning on Monday we will see greatly improved frequency between Forest Park in Missouri and Emerson Park in Illinois combined with reaching a whole new area of the region. These factors should contribute to many new transit riders. Still, we cannot discount convenience factors such as a debit card vs. exact change.
With the exception of the weekly and monthly passes, the light rail and bus service are very separate from a ticketing and perception point of view. Bus service has the ‘only for the poor’ stigma about it. Having a debit fare card that works on both systems might help bridge that perception gap.
What are your ideas, other than increase frequency, to bring in more riders to mass transit in our region?
– Steve
It sounds like Metro learned its pricing policy from the Arch Diocese.
Catholic schools usually charge the highest per- student tuition rates to families with only one child in the school. Families with multiple kids in school usually get a price break.
I’ve got an idea. Make it free.
Imagine what a boost to the cities economy it would bring. Plus, just like highways, the increased demand would cause citizens to beckon government to better the service and build more lines.
I say that as long as public highways are free, public transit should also be free.
I would not charge for distance on MetroBus. Come Monday, transit-dependents making one or more tranfers will already be paying 25-cents more ($2.25 fare) than their single-ride MetroLink counterparts ($2 fare), although Metro will at least be charging MetroLink riders ($2 fare) 25-cents more than single-ride MetroBus patrons ($1.75 fare).
It makes sense to charge more for single rides on MetroLink than MetroBus. However, since many MetroBus routes connect with MetroLink, as they should for improved travel time, many transit dependents must transfer. Luckily, Metro now offers unlimited tranfers within two hours, no longer requiring such patrons to acquire separate fares for more than one bus transfer. But transit-dependents making one or more transfers still end up paying more for a ticket than their single-ride MetroLink counterparts.
Finally, not only would distance-based fares be regressively paid more by transit-dependents working far from home, transit-choice commuters would have the means to avoid the fares. If I currently park at Shrewsbury or Shiloh, I might instead opt to respectively drive to Forest Park or Emerson Park. In other words, St. Louis doesn’t have the overall congestion levels of the Bay Area or DC to make distance-based fares competitively priced for transit-choice commuters.
Metro would like to go to smart card technology. MetroLink riders would have to run their card by a reader when entering and exiting the platform. The card could be used on buses as well.
The benefit would be the ability to do distance and time pricing. Metro in DC has a lower rate for non peak hours. Last I heard the cost for smart card technology was about $30 million. The ultimate result would be Metro would collect more fares with higher efficiency and presumably, just like DC, lots of tourist would go home with money still on their fare card.
Like a lot of things associated with transit, we could have it if we are willing to pay for it.
While I generaly support the idea of distance based fares, I am not sure they can be evenly or properly put into place with the current honor system used in St. Louis. Unless Metro is commited to making the entire rail system a pay to enter format, I just don’t see it working.
I do however, think that a small form of the distance based fair does make sense. On the MO side it seems pretty clear that while the folks outside of the 270 loop would like to see Metro extended beyond 270, the density and ridership make such expansions unlikely. Perhaps Metro should price any future extensions with high rates for those stations beyond 270, the idea being that the gov’t should provide little if any subsidy for riders beyond that point.
With the next two metrolink expansions likely going west out to westport or north past the airport, both lines would have support for building byeond 270, but Metro will likely not have the funds to build that far. This fair system could be used by Metro to build these lines farther than tax dollars ordinarly would allow.
One of my favorite topics . . . the last I heard, “smart cards” are still in their infancy as far as working in the real world of transit. The promise is there, but a lot of bugs and kinks need to be worked to make them truly viable.
Free is an idea that could work in an ideal world, but is a hard sell in the real world. Free encourages the homeless and the bored teen to hang out on the bus, scaring away “real” riders. Charging something also makes it easier to justify sticking the non-riding taxpayer for the rest of the cost of providing service.
Proximity readers and stored value cards are a wave of the future, and other areas are exploring their application beyond transit. Think about using the same card to pay for the bus, to park, to buy a latte or to buy a movie ticket. The flipside is the whole privacy issue. Some properties give you an alternative of registering and being able to refill your card or you just buy fixed amounts anonymously (similar to billed cellular service versus pre-paid service).
Charging for transfers is an ongoing discussion in the transit industry. If you charge for them, they have value and will less likely to be “shared” with other riders. If you make them free, it simplifies fare collection and reduces griping about having to transfer. Personally, I think a “day pass” (for $5 / 2½ base fares?) is the way to go – buy once, ride as much as you like. The only real loser is someone who only needs to make a one-way trip. I also like multi-day and weekly passes in addition to monthly passes. Non-electronic media can be sold on-board, at grocery stores, at Walgreens, at Quik Trip, etc., etc. Electronic media probably would need to be sold at specialized outlets (in the small volumes that would be expected).
Distance-based fares are another intellectual exercise. Revenue and the cost of providing service are NOT directly related in the transit industry. A bus or train costs $x.xx per hour to operate – cost of fuel + cost of operator + depreciated capital costs – whether it’s running empty or full. It has to operate, and it isn’t significantly more expensive to operate full (more weight = less mpg) than to run empty. Your fare is buying both the trip itself and the opportunity to take the trip (a set, expected frequency) on an established, published schedule.
In a similar vein, the cost of providing service, especially bus service, goes up in significant steps. While it costs $x.xx to run a bus that carries 2, 20 or 60 riders, the cost doubles when you have to add a second bus to accomodate 80 or 100 riders. Thus it makes as much sense to charge a premium for rush hour service (when the buses are full) as it does to charge for distance. (Or should Metro charge more on routes that are struggling [carrying relatively few riders] even though they provide needed service in poor, transit-dependent communities?)
The other “challenge” with distance-based fares is that someone is always just over the threshold and ends up paying the higher fare. From a marketing standpoint, I’m a big believer in just charging one fare for everything. You’re buying a trip from point A to point B, and it shouldn’t matter if it’s by bus or rail, or is direct or involves transfers. One big challenge is actually understanding what the fare actually is if you’re not a regular rider. And not understanding is one barrier to getting non-riders to try public transit. Very few people are going to travel any further than they have to, so there’s little chance of abuse there. And since the taxpayer is paying ½-¾ of the cost already, the brain damage spent collecting that last 15¢ or 25¢ gets lost by scaring away potential non-riders and/or giving the voter another reason to not like transit (they’re nickle and diming me again . . .).
Bottom line, transit needs to viewed as a service. It should charge more for premium services (like express buses and even parking), but charging for distance only makes sense when the distances are far greater than those covered by Metro here. Better to make the system more attractive and simpler to understand and to grow ridership. It’s hard to convince the voters that more support (higher taxes) are needed when all many see are “empty” buses . . .
An alternative to distance based pricing would be zone based pricing. Portland uses this system for their transit network. On Metrolink, zone boundaries could be established at North Hanley, Forest Park, Mississippi River, and Fairview Heights to create a total of 5 zones. To avoid having to pay extra for a short trip like Skinker to CWE or 5th & Missouri to Convention Center, tickets would be for a minimum 2-zone travel. Extra would be paid for 3, 4, or 5 zone travel.
Don’t forget that they already offer (decidedly low-tech) prepaid fares. Buy a booklet of 10 passes for $17.50, or $20 on Monday, and keep a few in your wallet.
Granted, if all you do is single-shot bus trips you lose 25 cents on the deal. But, you come out equal if you just take the train, and if you need to make any sort of transfer, you’re a shiny quarter ahead. Plus whatever the convenience of not having to dig to change is worth to you.
Also, since the tickets purchased now are good until the expiration date, buy before Monday as many prepaid tickets as you think you can use until they expire.
I wish they could just get rid of the honor system, though. It’d make more flexible methods of payment available, for one, and we’d stop killing trees with paper tickets. The validators, and when one must use one, are confusing for visitors or those who don’t ride often. Not to mention that the proof-of-payment system really breaks down when the trains are packed to capacity with ballgame attendees.
The honor system is based on simple economics. The money lost to fare evasion combined with the cost for the fare inspectors is less than the cost of installing and monitoring a “closed” system with turnstiles.
“o the person traveling to the end of the system (Illinois, Lambert or now Shrewsbury) the fare is a bargain relative to travel time, fuel, parking and such. But the person going only one or two stations away the fare really sucks.”
You’re showing your city-centricity 🙂 What if I go from Clayton to Shrewsbury? Or Maplewood to Brentwood? Just because one goes to the “end” of a line doesn’t mean one is travelling a great distance.
[REPLY Sorry for not pointing out all three ends to the system. I referenced end points that people might relate to. My point about distance based fares relates to your examples of going from Clayton to Shrewsbury or Brentwood to Maplewood. – SLP]
We have found that Jim Zavist is correct that the cost of enforcing a zone system using proof of payment is higher than the extra revenue collected. Metro has evaluated this repeatedly. While the Shiloh to Lambert trips are often used as an example of the need for a zone system, few people travel that far. The average trip distance is about 9 miles. Most trips originating at Lambert or Shiloh go about 17 miles. To generate any significant revenue, you would need at least five zones as someone suggested, but the cost of enforcement would wipe out the extra revenue.
We are very interested in the type of smart card system where we charge distance and perhaps peak hour rates. (WMATA prices on distance and time of day) However, on a proof of payment system, it would require that Metro charge the maximum fare upon first validation to insure post validation to obtain the deduction for short trips. However, within the US, this type of system is more of a beta system everywhere. WMATA, CTA and MTA primariy use mag stripe stored value. Both are experimenting with smart cards. We are not aware that anyone has successfully implemented the type of smart card system Steve describes.
Metro’s equipment can “read” effective days but can not “write” anything.
Metro is absolutely aware of the higher cost per mile for short trips. As a partial solution, Metro implemented its two hour pass one year ago. This permits some individuals who take short trips to make a round trip on one ticket with two hour transfers. This has been extremely popular and encourages a lot of short trips that would not have been taken without this fare.
Metro did receive some of the FTA funds for a new fare system. We do not have the $4 to $5 million in local matching funds because we are plowing all of our local capital into MetroLink and maintenance operations. This isn’t a sustainable approach to investment.
Finally, the barrier system versus proof of payment comes up over and over. The barrier system is really dependent upon the system of ticket sellers and people to monitor the barriers to prevent jumping the barriers. This has a huge cost associated with it. The MTA has literally constructed steal cages around the barriers. Metro would have to do some major construction to contruct this type of system.
I say use the existing technology and the debit card system. That way they can just have people scan your card. The whole system can still be “honor”. Just gives people a more conveniant option to do transit. I know you can get tickets online. But not everyone does that and I believe there is a service fee to have them mailed.
my .02
I really do agree with your reasoning. Metro needs to come up with some sort of reasonable fare based on stations, example, when you swipe a one-ride pass to enter a station, then you must swipe it by the exit of whatever station you get off at, and it charges you based on where you came from, how far you came from. before the turnstile would let you through, you would need to pay however much money it decided you need to pay. If it sees you came from Shrewsbury and you were at Sunnen, it could charge you 20 cents maybe. If it sees that you came from Shrewsbury and went to Busch Stadium, it would charge you more. It should have a small price for every station you pass through.
Maybe the charge should be 5-10 cents per station that you go through. If you go through 6 stations, you should get charged 5-10 cents for each of the stations you go through. That seems way more reasonable than the $2.00 fare if you are going to only one station away.
This will get a bit geeky, but here goes . . . one, there’s an opportunity cost associated with providing transit, you have to have buses and trains on a regular schedule to attract riders, and sometimes they’re full (and you get more fares) and sometimes they’re empty (no or few fares). Two, distance travelled is a minor factor in providing service in urban areas, time is a bigger factor. You have to pay your operators by the hour, not the mile, so it actually requires a substantially higher wage per mile to operate buses over short distances in stop-and-go traffic than it does to run Metrolink over longer distances. The same applies to fuel mileage on buses – you get better mileage going longer distances with fewer stops, but at some point you use more fuel just because the distance is longer. Three, transit should be viewed as an interconnected system, not a collection of discrete routes – there should not be a fare penalty for having to transfer to get to your destination (you’re already likely facing a time penalty). The current two hour pass ackowledges this; the proposal to allow only one transfer guts the concept. Combine all these, and the simplest solution would be time-based fares, say $1.00 or $1.25 per hour, a $5, $6, or $8 day pass and an $80-$100 monthly pass. KISS, get people where they want to go and don’t confuse them with complex fare equations, and you’ll have a more-successful system!
You should just have to swipe a one trip pass at a station turnstile to enter, then when you get to the exit turnstile at their destination, you just swipe their pass, the scanner calculates how much you owe based on the station that you started at (the scanner can read where you first swiped your pass to enter the station) and then you pay with credit card or cash however much it calculates that you need to pay (the turnstile could have a place to swipe your credit card). This system’s worth a try…
Jim, yes, it’s worth a try . . . anything is. The one big hurdle I see, pardon the pun, is the swiping twice part. One, you double the number of contact points with the patron, doubling the number of potential points for fare evasion and doubling the number of points that require manned security. Two, you slow down the boarding and/or the deboarding process – when you pay once to baord, it’s a lot easier and quicker for everyone to exit. And three, you introduce a significant privacy-invasion issue – with cards assigned to patrons, you can obviously track everyone’s movements within the system, and many people aren’t comfortable with that kind of big-brother “oversight”.
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Remember, part of what you pay in any fare is for all the trips you don’t take, you’re paying to have service available, even if you choose not to use it.
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Your idea is not without merit – some properties charge when you get on a bus going from the suburbs into downtown, but let you on for free for the return trip, but won’t let you off until you pay a fare in the less-congested suburbs.
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I also understand your logic – you want a distance-based fare structure, assuming that a short trip costs less to provide than a longer one. While distance is one variable, ridership (how full the bus or train is, on average, and how many fares are collected, in total, over the entire route) is a more-accurate reflection of what it costs to provide service, and, in turn, what the fare really should be to “break even”. It costs Metro the same to run a train between Shrewsbury and Clayton as it does to run one between the Convention Center and Union Station – similar distances, similar schedules, but the first run probably attracts probably only half as many riders as the second run – should the first group of riders pay twice as much?!
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