Consider This for the Smart SmarTrip

As Metro is considering a price hike, maybe there's a better way to do it than what General Manager John Catoe is proposing. I was in Britain over the summer and learned about London's Oyster card for my trip. The Oyster card is Transport for London's farecard, similar to the SmarTrip card. Customers with an Oyster card are offered cheaper fares than for individuals with paper tickets. For example, a trip in Zone 1 of London (the downtown) costs £1.50 whereas a similar trip with a paper ticket costs £4. (The Oyster fare schedule is here .) This is a huge incentive for Londoners and those who travel in London to cease using paper tickets and get an Oyster card. Wikipedia notes, "By March 2007, over 10 million Oyster cards had been issued and more than 80% of all journeys on services run by Transport for London used the Oyster card." Second, pricing as noted is a way to discourage paper tickets. Third, from a political perspective, voters aren't burdened with higher rates, while non-frequent users, such as tourists and out-of-town businesspeople, are.

 

This may be a good concept for WMATA to follow. I know that WMATA has been attempting to move away from paper tickets, however, there hasn't been much incentive to do so with the SmarTrip card. Additionally, there is public discontent with the large fare hike Mr. Catoe is proposing, so maybe putting the price increase on non-frequent users without SmarTrip cards would be more politically feasible. I'm not proposing a difference in pricing as great as London's because I'm sure there is a better balance.

 

I've heard it said that Metro is "the peoples' transit system", referring to the large number of tourists from around the country that use the system. This may be true, but the system isn't Gray Line Tours and hasn't become successful because of tourists' use. Rather the system is successful from the ridership of daily customers and it would make sense then to reward them.

Paul DeMaio, BikeArlington

Comments

[Developersagent.com]

Thats a great idea. With the price hike it will be cheaper for me to drive in to my downtown office from Bethesda than to take the metro across the street from my home.

The city is making a bad decision if they dont create incentives for daily users.

Thanks for the great article

[sro]

One reward for SmarTrip card users, which could be implemented immediately, would be a reduced-price transfer from Metrobus to Metrorail. There is no technological reason why this discount couldn't be programmed into the system. Doing so would provide an incentive to use the bus to reach rail and would be more fair than the system currently in place which allows 35-cent transfers only when going to the bus from rail. Before SmarTrip it wouldn't have been feasible due to the electronic gates on Metrorail, but now there is no excuse.

As it stands, I don't use the SmarTrip card on buses now, because when you pay the cash fare it is the same amount, plus the driver may give you a paper transfer valid for more time than the strict 2 hours provided when SmarTrip is used. Therefore, on WMATA, there is more of an incentive to stick with paper than to use the card and commuters using bus and rail end up paying more going in one direction than the other.