Thursday, December 4, 2008
Metrobus transfer elimination
Washington City Paper's Sarah Godfrey has an excellent piece about the elimination of bus tranfers. The article goes beyond the simple nuts-and-bolts of the change and investigates the social aspects of transfers. It's definitely worth a read.
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Here's a brief story on Philly's attempt to eliminate paper transfers: http://cbs3.com/local/SEPTA.Transfer.City.2.310904.html
Thanks!
Looks like the issue was that Philly was trying to eliminate transfers altogether. In this case WMATA is continuing allowing free transfers, you just have to have a card.
Philly's situation was that you used to be able to pay a discounted 75 cents when you got on the first bus to get a transfer, as opposed to $1.45. They tried to eliminate that.
I haven't given it enough thought, but would it make sense for WMATA to just eliminate transfers altogether and make it $1.00 per ride, and $0.75 with a Smartrip card, with no transfers at all, ever? It would be slightly more expensive for people who transfer, but a lot cheaper for those who do not. I'd try to make it revenue neutral and retain the option to get a reasonable bus pass but I don't know what would be the revenue neutral amount.
The average bus fare when you take into account all passes, transfers, discounts, etc, is around 75 cents, according to WMATA.
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