Higher Fares and Fees Proposed for Next Year’s MTA Budget
On the agenda for Tuesday’s board meeting: a budget for the next two fiscal years (as required by last year’s Proposition A), with several fare and fine increases to cover a two-year operating deficit of $81 million. Most notable for Muni riders is a proposed $10 increase in the monthly Fast Pass, and a $5 increase in the discounted pass, beginning in 2009. However, it appears that cash fares won’t go up – so more riders will pay cash, which is exactly opposite of London’s strategy to move riders to passes to speed boarding. Parking fees are also proposed to increase.
More details as we see the exact budget proposal, but an initial recommendation: make it easier to get a fast pass! Muni needs to encourage more people to use passes, not more difficult and expensive. Many other systems let you buy a monthly pass via vending machines that take credit cards; only Muni forces you to go to a corner store, and hope they haven’t run out (see one blogger’s comment on this), or remember to order online during a twelve day window.
Update: Matier and Ross comment on the proposed expired meter fine, noting that it might scare away downtown shoppers – of course, ignoring entirely those shoppers who take mass transit.
Update 2: The MTA is expecting to raise $100M per year from parking fines from this year’s budget, spending it mainly on filling staffing shortages to improve service.
This is all really very nice and I agree with what you have said. Now what can we DO about it? How do we mobilize? Would a click action campaign be useful? I get the feeling this issue is really talking to the choir because in this town, the “pass” is seen as a yuppie convenience and it’s price is ok to increase, but the “working man” who pays each time, oh, no, we should NOT increase THAT ticket – god forbid. “We are socialist! We should only charge the rich who can afford a fast pass that costs less than a single ticket used 5 days a week!” How ridiculous.
Raising the fast pass fare is reasonable. For commuters the pass will still be less than the cash fare. But raising the cash fare also seems reasonable. Daily commuters are working men and women and many are subsidized by their employers with commuter checks. I am not clear on ECadovate’s point.
Like Don, I don’t have a huge problem with raising fares–Muni is priced below most transit systems in the area and in the country, and service cuts aren’t a plausible political option outside the TEP framework.
But this suggestion seems really dumb. Even setting aside the effect of cash customers on the boarding process, a transit-first city ought to be setting up a fare structure that encourages people to ditch their cars for short trips within the city. In the eternal conflict between the pain of Muni and the pain of parking, FastPass holders are almost certainly more likely to opt for the former.
I’d be happy with $2 cash fares, $18 weekly passes, and $55 FastPasses. There’s nothing sacred about $45; the financial incentive for buying a pass is more important, imho.
[…] Policy « Higher Fares and Fees Proposed for Next Year’s MTA Budget […]