Starting October 17th, passes can be added to Smartrip at any retail location which sells Smartrip cards (http://www.wmata.com/about_metro/news/PressReleaseDetail.cfm?ReleaseID=4686)
Outside that the pass can't be bought at fare machines, this is a shocking move that has only upsides. The sales locations for "bus passes" increases to include all CVS's within Metro's sales area which might solve a lot of the access problems in poor areas. Also, the passes will go from fixed Sunday-Saturday to seven days from the first use and one will be able to buy two weeks worth of passes in one transaction with the latter rolling into the former.
Now, would a card be able to hold a bus pass and be able to maintain a declining rail balance (or be able to plug in the difference for express buses) or will this open a whole other can of beans?
Quote from: Scrabbleship on October 12, 2010, 10:39:19 AM
Starting October 17th, passes can be added to Smartrip at any retail location which sells Smartrip cards (http://www.wmata.com/about_metro/news/PressReleaseDetail.cfm?ReleaseID=4686)
Outside that the pass can't be bought at fare machines, this is a shocking move that has only upsides. The sales locations for "bus passes" increases to include all CVS's within Metro's sales area which might solve a lot of the access problems in poor areas. Also, the passes will go from fixed Sunday-Saturday to seven days from the first use and one will be able to buy two weeks worth of passes in one transaction with the latter rolling into the former.
Now, would a card be able to hold a bus pass and be able to maintain a declining rail balance (or be able to plug in the difference for express buses) or will this open a whole other can of beans?
I'd like to think yes, they don't say anything about needing more than one card.
What I don't get is why you can't just pay for the pass on the bus and load it there.
Loading cash value on the bus causes a lot of problems - I should know because I have to deal with solving those problems at my TA, and just about everyone else who has to deal with those issues with other TAs feels the same way...it delays the buses and causes too much confusion as it is.
The ideal would be all the current sales locations + CVS + rail stations. Also, my agency is testing an autoload pass that would renew automatically whenever it expires. Put all those options together, and it's really hard to say we still need to do it on the bus, in light of the problems that causes.
Quote from: Tristan on October 12, 2010, 01:45:44 PM
Loading cash value on the bus causes a lot of problems - I should know because I have to deal with solving those problems at my TA, and just about everyone else who has to deal with those issues with other TAs feels the same way...it delays the buses and causes too much confusion as it is.
The ideal would be all the current sales locations + CVS + rail stations. Also, my agency is testing an autoload pass that would renew automatically whenever it expires. Put all those options together, and it's really hard to say we still need to do it on the bus, in light of the problems that causes.
I can't imagine how much programming all of this requires. I guess they wanted MTA to test out the loading passes option first.
Quote from: Tristan on October 12, 2010, 01:45:44 PM
Loading cash value on the bus causes a lot of problems - I should know because I have to deal with solving those problems at my TA, and just about everyone else who has to deal with those issues with other TAs feels the same way...it delays the buses and causes too much confusion as it is.
If I had a dollar for every person who tried to load money on a Smartrip, got the beeps of doom, and held up the bus, I could buy a week's worth of bus passes for a whole bunch of people.
Back when I was up in upstate New York, CDTA began selling a one-day pass to make up for eliminating transfers. The only problem is that they only sold them onboard buses. The result was that at key stops there would be LONG dwell times because of people buying the pass on board, fumbling their $3 (now $4) to get the farebox (Odyssey, a la everyone here) to get it to work. Since I left they added 10-ride tickets and 7-day passes to try to get the "sometimes but not daily" riders off of killing headways.
QuoteThe ideal would be all the current sales locations + CVS + rail stations. Also, my agency is testing an autoload pass that would renew automatically whenever it expires. Put all those options together, and it's really hard to say we still need to do it on the bus, in light of the problems that causes.
My only question is how would you allow bus pass sales at rail stations with the current machines? Wouldn't it be easier to just wait until new farecard machines are procured instead (since it's somewhat inevitable)?
Of course, GGW weighs in on this...and puts pessimism into the picture (http://greatergreaterwashington.org/post.cgi?id=7586)
I do agree that bus pass holders shouldn't get a double discount and should pay full-fare for rail. In the time I had a bus pass and only used Smartrip for rail, I never even thought that I was losing the discount though having a bus-only commute made all else gravy. I still think that this might get a lot of fringe people to move to passes, especially since in the current setup many places run out quick and the fixed amount of time is a bit discouaging.
Quote from: Scrabbleship on October 12, 2010, 02:24:47 PM
Quote from: Tristan on October 12, 2010, 01:45:44 PM
The ideal would be all the current sales locations + CVS + rail stations. Also, my agency is testing an autoload pass that would renew automatically whenever it expires. Put all those options together, and it's really hard to say we still need to do it on the bus, in light of the problems that causes.
My only question is how would you allow bus pass sales at rail stations with the current machines? Wouldn't it be easier to just wait until new farecard machines are procured instead (since it's somewhat inevitable)?
Well now there's a reason I said *ideal* ... no word on that proposal of 2+ years ago to replace the farecard machines.