Metro Transit fares

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talindsay
Wells Fargo Center
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Re: Public Transit News and Current Happenings

Postby talindsay » March 30th, 2017, 1:19 pm

That's a strange practice, might be because it is a middle school?
Yeah, students at participating high schools can still get them that way, but the list is fairly limited and includes no middle schools, even though the passes are theoretically available to middle schoolers, and many of them ride the bus. But even for participating high schoolers, that's a shockingly outdated way to handle it. Why not just offer a U-Pass equivalent? Or something more automated, at least.

Tcmetro
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Re: Metro Transit fares

Postby Tcmetro » March 30th, 2017, 2:25 pm

I'm not sure about the availability of the Unlimited Goto Student Pass outside of MPS and the two schools in the SPPS program, but it seems that MT offers the Summer Pass ($25/$30-both are given) for three months at a lot of schools across the region. Doesn't look like they provide any discounts to middle schoolers over the summer though.

When I was in high school, Metro Transit didn't offer the unlimited pass option to any high school (IIRC, it started sometime around 2012-2014), only the 10-ride magnetic cards. Looks like they've moved on to temporary paper Goto cards that have an RFID chip inside.

https://www.metrotransit.org/summer-student-pass\

Looking into it more, a school is charged $87.50 per pass per quarter and must buy at least five passes. I'm not sure if schools pass the cost on to the kids. With the magnetic cards it seems that the school just acts as an intermediary and incurs no cost.

https://www.metrotransit.org/student-pass-admin

RailBaronYarr
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Re: Metro Transit fares

Postby RailBaronYarr » March 30th, 2017, 2:45 pm

I know there's a feeling of safety in having a school bus be the thing that picks your kid up within your neighborhood and drops them off directly at school (and maybe that can remain for elementary schools). But I made a point in this piece about some non-zero amount of school transportation budgets could possibly just go toward funding fixed-route transit and we let kids ride the bus for free until they're 18. For MPS, the total transpo budget is over $30m a year. Call me a socialist, but this whole paying for the bus thing, with all the ways we need to back-subsidize (or run dedicated pass systems for) low income people, middle school students, college students, etc is so... Regular reminder that the total fares people pay while boarding anywhere in Minneapolis is ~$58m a year.

Korh
Union Depot
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Re: Metro Transit fares

Postby Korh » March 31st, 2017, 5:21 pm

Might only be me but with the fair increase I kind of hope metro starts talking about the possibility of adding more zones besides the 2 downtown ones as well as an easier way to pay for them. For instance I know I'm being a little idealistic but I kind of imagine something like the London underground system where you tap your go-to card at the initial station and when arrived at your destination, you tap your card again depending where it was it charges you the appropriate amount

Vagueperson
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Re: Metro Transit fares

Postby Vagueperson » April 1st, 2017, 6:41 am

Great idea, Korh, but would need a lot of $$ to implement that system. Can't remember - does public transit in London not take cash at all?

Korh
Union Depot
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Re: Metro Transit fares

Postby Korh » April 1st, 2017, 8:12 am

They do have ticket machines but there not on the station platforms which is probably the biggest issue trying to implement it into our system, it kinda works like how you trsnsfer from bus to bus here where you insert your ticket in a machine then spits it back out.

Tcmetro
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Re: Metro Transit fares

Postby Tcmetro » April 9th, 2017, 10:18 am

The fare increase proposal will be presented at the next Transportation Committee meeting tomorrow. Two fare increase options are proceeding, the 25 cent and the 50 cent increases across the board. The agenda item has all the related pass price increases as well as the other options being recommended, like the low-income transit fare, the single reduced fare, the single express fare, etc.

https://metrocouncil.org/Council-Meetin ... 84-SW.aspx

mamundsen
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Re: Metro Transit fares

Postby mamundsen » April 9th, 2017, 1:14 pm

No change to $76 metropass? I don't see it listed.

jebr
Nicollet Mall
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Re: Metro Transit fares

Postby jebr » April 9th, 2017, 2:33 pm

The local off-peak pass is jumping much higher than the rest of the passes, especially on a percentage basis. It does make sense to try and bridge the gap between the two fare passes (right now it's almost universally cheaper to just get the $59 and pay the difference in stored value each rush hour) but a 22-ish% jump in a single month is tough, especially since that's the cheapest fare pass. I really hope they either reduce that increase or gradually increase it over a 1-3 year period. The Transit Accessibility Pass should help with that some, but if someone's not eligible for it but still has tight finances the increase isn't minor, especially if you have multiple people in the household with passes.

I also think removing the bonus on stored value is a terrible idea. There suddenly becomes no real monetary incentive to have a stored value Go-To card (since there's no proposal to eliminate paper transfers that I can see.) Reducing it but still keeping something there would be beneficial - maybe even making it 5% additional bonus (so $1 per $20 added) or some other sort of rewards program would help incentivize using a Go-To Card. There's still real cost in processing cash transactions on buses and cash/credit card transactions at TVMs, not to mention dwell time savings by using a Go-To card on buses, so offering an incentive for helping to reduce that cost and time for Metro Transit would help keep parity. (I think discontinuing paper transfers is a bit too far in the other direction and has much more significant downfalls, especially for the poorest riders, than simply having cash payers miss out on a small incentive to use a Go-To card.)

Thinking about it more, a rewards program for Go-To card usage that maybe was a bit more random or had a set budget each month could be cheaper and better than having to set out fare for each person. Something even as simple as drawing 10 or so random Go-To card users for a free monthly pass or $50 in stored value, with each tap counting as a entry, could be a way to still offer some incentive while keeping the cost manageable for Metro Transit (especially compared to a 5-10% cost...while I don't have the numbers in front of me, $15,120ish in passes given out in the worst-case scenario of 10 $126 passes every month is likely still a significant savings over the current bonus, and most people probably would only use that $126 pass as a $99 pass with maybe an extra express bus once or twice since they'd have the full pass.) That potentially paired with a points program to earn a gift card (maybe purchased at a discount,) Metro Transit swag, or tickets (many of which seem to be donated to Metro Transit as I've seen them given away somewhat frequently on their Facebook page) could offer an incentive with much less monetary outlay or loss of revenue to Metro Transit than the current program.

cooperrez
Landmark Center
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Re: Metro Transit fares

Postby cooperrez » April 14th, 2017, 7:46 am

How many people here have employers who participate in the Metropass program? Has anyone ever successfully lead a charge to get their employer to participate? I'm trying to get mine to do so. Any tips?

David Greene
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Re: Metro Transit fares

Postby David Greene » April 14th, 2017, 9:02 am

Cray participates but I have no idea how that got started. I think it began when we moved to downtown St. Paul. No subsidy from the company, though, but pre-tax payment is pretty nice.

cooperrez
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Re: Metro Transit fares

Postby cooperrez » April 14th, 2017, 10:25 am

So with no company subsidy, right now the pass would be $76.00 for unlimited rides during 1 month, right?

mamundsen
Wells Fargo Center
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Re: Metro Transit fares

Postby mamundsen » April 14th, 2017, 10:57 am

My company does Metropass. No subsidy but $76 pretax means it only changes my paycheck by ~$54. Well worth it.

bptenor
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Re: Metro Transit fares

Postby bptenor » April 14th, 2017, 11:29 am

Regions does pay 25% of any value added to your GoTo card, which is the same discount you'd get on parking in one of their ramps. But you have to choose either parking or transit, not both. The nice thing is it's pre-tax and you get the added 10% bonus that everyone gets from loading the card, and automatic payroll deduction in any amount you choose.

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Silophant
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Re: Metro Transit fares

Postby Silophant » April 14th, 2017, 11:57 am

Xcel pays $50 towards the Metropass, which is pretty great. Even though I mostly walk or bike, no reason not to get a pass when it's only $26 a month, pre-tax.
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DDeFoster
Block E
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Re: Metro Transit fares

Postby DDeFoster » April 14th, 2017, 12:07 pm

My company covers half the cost and payroll-deducts the rest. Given how much I use it it comes to about a quarter a ride, which is a price I can't possible complain about in 2017 and great for employee goodwill. They've been doing it for more than the three years I've been there though, so I don't know what had to happen to get them to buy in.

cooperrez
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Re: Metro Transit fares

Postby cooperrez » April 14th, 2017, 12:44 pm

Just so I understand correctly, are these end prices per month for unlimited rides per month or is this for a set total amount on the card per month? I'm very jealous of you all.

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Silophant
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Re: Metro Transit fares

Postby Silophant » April 14th, 2017, 12:53 pm

Unlimited, for everything except Northstar (which requires stored value for the portion of the fare >$3). It's the best deal out there.
Joey Senkyr
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David Greene
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Re: Metro Transit fares

Postby David Greene » April 14th, 2017, 1:57 pm

Regions does pay 25% of any value added to your GoTo card, which is the same discount you'd get on parking in one of their ramps. But you have to choose either parking or transit, not both. The nice thing is it's pre-tax and you get the added 10% bonus that everyone gets from loading the card, and automatic payroll deduction in any amount you choose.
So this isn't Metropass, right? It's a special GoTo arrangement by Regions?

bptenor
Nicollet Mall
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Re: Metro Transit fares

Postby bptenor » April 14th, 2017, 4:05 pm

^^^That's correct. Wish we had the metropass option though.


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