FY 2014 Operating Budget etc etc etc etc...

dcipjr wrote:Is POP really THAT hard to implement?

No. SEPTA and some of the county and state officials are absolutely mortified by fear of rampant fare evasion. Never mind the success of POP on other commuter rail systems: our fare evaders are special.

And no, while the alternative DVARP proposed was compatible with POP in the future, we were not insisting on it now.

Amtrak7 wrote:I like the flat fares. $2.25 cash / $1.80 discounted sounds reasonable to me. But the NHSL with a flat $2.75 sounds high especially given the upcoming Bridgeport bridge closure...and notice that bus 123 has the 3 zone flat fare. Large fare increase for those riders!

That NHSL fare baffles me, and I have no idea (yet) how it's going to work with transfers, et cetera. I guess it must be compensating for eliminating fare zones on the line. But it's a terrible deal for riders on the inner part of the line (my first regular SEPTA commute was on the P&W from Haverford with a Gateway Transpass). Most of the 123 riders are reverse commuters so they'll have passes. I think a zone 1 will still be good over the entire line.

We'll try and get some answers for you.

doesn't this NPT and the next fare raise just benefit the zone 5 riders? they don't get higher fares for monthly passes and weekly passes

zebrasepta wrote:I wouldn't be surprised if SEPTA's ridership goes down a bit because of increased fares especially on the NPT

I don't think anyone doubts there'll be some short term ridership loss from the fare increase: there always is, though ridership is a lot less fare-sensitive than it used to be. The NPT plan itself might have more fare decreases than increases, especially for non-daily riders on the RRD. Pass and "token/transfer" rates will be unchanged when NPT takes effect.

and at least the monthly pass for a zone 5 rider like me won't be hiked up, so basically zone 5 riders get the biggest benefit out of the fare hike/NPT change

Actually, the inner half of current zone 4 gets the biggest benefit since their fares will actually drop. Looking at in the long run, though, things balance out. The net railroad-side increases were larger than transit the last two or three fare packages, and the cash fare (which will go up in both 2013 and 2014) hadn't been touched in ages.

Matthew Mitchell wrote:I think a zone 1 will still be good over the entire line.

TrailPass 1 + $1. There is no discount for local travel along West Chester Pk anymore, its a flat fare.

Back to rail transit, the tariff says the NHSL will be a transfer/TrailPass/token + 50 cents. There is no mention of a discounted transfer, so Ardmore to 40th St would be $3.75 cash or $3.30 token and transfer.

Matthew Mitchell wrote:

dcipjr wrote:I wonder if that's 50 / 200 per mode of transportation, or total rides? Either way I don't think we'll hit it.

Total boardings. Put yourself in the shoes of a reverse commuter working in King of Prussia: bus to the El, El to 69th Street, NHSL to Gulph Mills, 123 to the mall. I'm sure that there are scores of such people making that trip every day. That's eight boardings round trip. Work six day weeks in the holi season, and you're hitting that limit.

DVARP is going to try to work with SEPTA to develop a more flexible system.

The 3.75 premium fare for the 123, 124, & 125 appears to apply even to local rides between KOP & Gulph Mills, or along West Chester pike between the Blue Route & 69th St. In Dr. Mitchell's example, the rider would be dinged for TWO premium fares.

The exact same ride between Manoa & 69th St. would be 1.50 more on the 123 vs. the 104. Huh??

Finally, the transfer limit of 90 min, IMHO, is just too short. Suppose you take the 104 from West Chester to 69th St. or the 125 from CCP to KoP & hit traffic. You might not even reach your transfer point within 90 min.

Matthew Mitchell wrote:That NHSL fare baffles me, and I have no idea (yet) how it's going to work with transfers, et cetera.

I thought that I read that transfers were eliminated. Please correct me if I'm wrong on this. Is there a window for a discounted rate if you've tapped in on one route and then tap in within a certain timeframe on another? It seems to me that no transfers works against casual riders that pay in cash. Full price for each leg? No thanks.

Quinn wrote:I thought that I read that transfers were eliminated. Please correct me if I'm wrong on this. Is there a window for a discounted rate if you've tapped in on one route and then tap in within a certain timeframe on another?

Exactly.

It seems to me that no transfers works against casual riders that pay in cash. Full price for each leg? No thanks.

Correct. We would oppose it too (and did oppose just such a proposal three years ago) but for the fact that now it's going to come with an open payment system in which you'll be able to use an ordinary chip-enabled credit or debit card, ID card, cell phone, or other registered device right at the turnstile, with no need to find a place to buy tokens or a SEPTA-branded card. As long as just about everyone can access the discounted options, DVARP is OK with abolishing paper transfers and requiring cash riders to pay an additional base fare for connecting trips.

I think POP similar to NJT's light rail could actually save money and give added flexibility to riders. But that would mean putting in and maintaining some form of TVM, which spax mgmt thinks are the devil. Forbid they actually revise RRD ticketing to more easily work with the bus system either!

It really feels like these folks are in a windowless room thinking everything they do is brilliant.

No. SEPTA and some of the county and state officials are absolutely mortified by fear of rampant fare evasion. Never mind the success of POP on other commuter rail systems: our fare evaders are special.

What they should be mortified about is the monthly TrailPass holders that are going to be irritated when NPT gets implemented. I would say most of the folks on my train in the morning have passes of some kind, and right now, the only thing we have to do is flash the pass at the conductor when he or she walks by. Since my line is a short one (Hill West), generally you show your pass once. And you're done.

Now, instead of that, we'l have to do this tag-in and tag-out nonsense, and fight past other commuters at a fare gate.

For pass holders, NPT is not an upgrade at all -- quite the opposite -- and it seems like SEPTA is concentrating more on fighting the fringe fare-evaders instead of pleasing their daily ridership.

That's a bad strategy, if you ask me.

dcipjr wrote:What they should be mortified about is the monthly TrailPass holders that are going to be irritated when NPT gets implemented. I would say most of the folks on my train in the morning have passes of some kind, and right now, the only thing we have to do is flash the pass at the conductor when he or she walks by. Since my line is a short one (Hill West), generally you show your pass once. And you're done.

Now, instead of that, we'l have to do this tag-in and tag-out nonsense, and fight past other commuters at a fare gate.

For pass holders, NPT is not an upgrade at all -- quite the opposite -- and it seems like SEPTA is concentrating more on fighting the fringe fare-evaders instead of pleasing their daily ridership.

That's a bad strategy, if you ask me.

That's the point DVARP has been making the past two years.

Everywhere else in North America where a "tag off" system has been implemented, it is optional and commuters have the choice of using a pass just like we have now. Non-daily riders who want the convenience and discounts of a smart card tag on, and daily commuters can walk past the tag readers and right to the train.

MichaelBug wrote:

Matthew Mitchell wrote:

dcipjr wrote:I wonder if that's 50 / 200 per mode of transportation, or total rides? Either way I don't think we'll hit it.

Total boardings. Put yourself in the shoes of a reverse commuter working in King of Prussia: bus to the El, El to 69th Street, NHSL to Gulph Mills, 123 to the mall. I'm sure that there are scores of such people making that trip every day. That's eight boardings round trip. Work six day weeks in the holi season, and you're hitting that limit.

DVARP is going to try to work with SEPTA to develop a more flexible system.

The 3.75 premium fare for the 123, 124, & 125 appears to apply even to local rides between KOP & Gulph Mills, or along West Chester pike between the Blue Route & 69th St. In Dr. Mitchell's example, the rider would be dinged for TWO premium fares.

The exact same ride between Manoa & 69th St. would be 1.50 more on the 123 vs. the 104. Huh??

Finally, the transfer limit of 90 min, IMHO, is just too short. Suppose you take the 104 from West Chester to 69th St. or the 125 from CCP to KoP & hit traffic. You might not even reach your transfer point within 90 min.

These are VERY good points! I didn't see the section about limiting transfers to 90 minutes. When there are routes like the 113 that are well over an hour (almost 2?) long, if you have a long transfer, it will expire. Why make the transfer period shorter? A period of 3 hours would be best for me, especially since you can only make one transfer and you are paying for it. If it were a system like in the DC Metropolitan Region where you have free unlimited transfers for a period of time, then I can understand the shorter limit (though it would still be too short at 90 minutes).

I also highly agree with you about the local service on the 123/124/125 before they get on the highway. It would be ridiculous to charge these local riders full premium fares, especially when these routes (particularly the 124/125) are the only lines that serve certain stops. It's not all about mall workers from Philadelphia to King of Prussia, here!

SEPTA seemed to be set in stone with how they wanted to do NPT fare tagging, despite various advisory groups meeting with them and trying to come up with other ideas.

Tritransit Area wrote:I also highly agree with you about the local service on the 123/124/125 before they get on the highway. It would be ridiculous to charge these local riders full premium fares, especially when these routes (particularly the 124/125) are the only lines that serve certain stops. It's not all about mall workers from Philadelphia to King of Prussia, here!

What it looks like is that SEPTA rejected the idea of having those local riders (e.g. Gulph Mills-King of Prussia) tag off if they get off before the express zone, in which case the excess fare would be rebated to their account.

We've got a year or so to work on them to fix the details so the implementation of NPT won't be so ham-handed.

Matthew Mitchell wrote:

Quinn wrote:I thought that I read that transfers were eliminated. Please correct me if I'm wrong on this. Is there a window for a discounted rate if you've tapped in on one route and then tap in within a certain timeframe on another?

Exactly.

It seems to me that no transfers works against casual riders that pay in cash. Full price for each leg? No thanks.

Correct. We would oppose it too (and did oppose just such a proposal three years ago) but for the fact that now it's going to come with an open payment system in which you'll be able to use an ordinary chip-enabled credit or debit card, ID card, cell phone, or other registered device right at the turnstile, with no need to find a place to buy tokens or a SEPTA-branded card. As long as just about everyone can access the discounted options, DVARP is OK with abolishing paper transfers and requiring cash riders to pay an additional base fare for connecting trips.

Unless you are privileged enough to have an NFC equipped Android Phone (which is still not quite so common) or have a bank that even offers a chip-enabled credit/debit card (even more rare) this really is a nice hit against transit riders that aren't able to access the sales locations to buy the SEPTA branded cards. This particularly applies to folks coming in from out of town. I hated it when WMATA did this with their Smartrip card, and I'm really not happy that SEPTA is doing this as well. A fare 70 cents higher than the SEPTA Media fare and you have to pay full price for each transfer, especially if it takes 2 to 3 vehicles to get to your destination? Might as well drive or take a taxi. This creates an even larger "barrier" to riders than the existing system does.

It's a shame that there can't be some sort of card that the operators can print or punch out so that cash passengers could at least transfer at a discounted rate, even if it is $1.50.