Here’s the news release from Metrolink:
LOS ANGELES – After skipping a fare increase last year, the Metrolink Board of Directors approved a seven percent average systemwide fare increase to go into effect on or after July 1, 2012. Funds generated from the increase will be used exclusively to help close a $13 million funding gap for the fiscal year 2012-13 budget.
“This is a last resort to be able to continue to offer the safe transportation options the region needs without cutting service. We’ve streamlined our operations and continue to keep the majority of our costs and headcount flat, despite a nine percent increase in ridership,” said Metrolink Board Chairman Richard Katz. “Last year, we were able to delay an increase to passenger fares and member agency subsidies while increasing train service by 14 percent. This year, despite continued efficient management practices, our costs have increased in large part because of an increase in our operations contracts due to a sweeping nationwide labor negotiation settlement and a 56 percent increase in fuel costs over the past two years.”
Of the $13 million funding gap, the fare increase will only generate $4.5 million dollars. Increased subsidy from Metrolink’s five member agencies will cover the remainder of the funding gap.
Specific cost increases include:
•$4.2 million increase in major contractor costs including but not limited to the rise in Amtrak’s contract to reflect their nationwide labor settlement
•$4 million increase in fuel costs (in the past two years, Metrolink’s fuel costs have increased by 56 percent)
•$1.3 million in connecting transit transfer costs for Metrolink riders
•$2.5 million for post-employment benefits, which weren’t previously budgeted for. (This is not a new cost or an increase in benefits. It’s being included in the budget for the first time this year.)
This proposed fare increase is independent from the 2004 Board adopted policy to restructure fares from zone-based to mileage-based fares over a 10-year period. The phased restructuring is not meant to generate additional revenue for Metrolink, but was implemented to ensure a fair and equitable fare policy. When combined with the 7 percent increase, the Metrolink Monthly Pass will cost approximately $20.00 more beginning on or after July 1, 2012. However, the impact of the fare increase varies depending on the type of ticket, distance traveled and where the trip begins and ends.
As a recipient of Federal Transit Administration (FTA) funding, Metrolink is required to comply with Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and to carry out the United States Department of Transportation’s Title VI regulations, in addition to federal and state law that requires a public hearing before fares can be modified. Public comments and suggestions on the proposed fare increase and Title VI Service Delivery Policy were collected beginning April 27, 2012. Metrolink conducted additional public meetings across its five-county service area to allow the public to weigh-in on the board’s pending action. Approximately 159 individuals – about .7 percent of Metrolink’s daily riders – submitted comments regarding the fare increase. Seventeen individuals provided comments on the service delivery policy.
ABOUT METROLINK (www.metrolinktrains.com)
Metrolink is Southern California’s regional commuter rail service in its 19th year of operation. The Southern California Regional Rail Authority (SCRRA), a joint powers authority made up of an 11-member board representing the transportation commissions of Los Angeles, Orange, Riverside, San Bernardino and Ventura counties, governs the service. Metrolink operates over seven routes through a six-county, 512 route-mile network. Metrolink is the third largest commuter rail agency in the United States based on directional route miles and the seventh largest based on annual ridership.
Central LA Metrolink Rider,
Please look at the comment I made regarding Metrolink. Most people in Los Angeles aren’t going to avoid riding the Expo Line, Red Line or the busses because of Metrolink’s fare structure. Very few of us have ever even ridden Metrolink in the first place. Where did I imply LA residents should not be restricted or discouraged from Metrolink? Your comment that implies racism and elitism on my part is completely off-base and I think you should apologize.
I would be for distance based fares if they were standardized,
The question is would you think it is more simple if you get on a bus going to a destination and not knowing how much your fare would be until you got off? On a distance based fare system this would be the case, unless you knew the exact mileage between your entry and your destination.
By the way, I think you are exaggerating the complexity of the system. If you live in Santa Monica you might use SM BBB and Metro consistently, but the chances of using a bunch of other systems like Metrolink and Dash would be fairly small and if that were the case, wouldn’t you just buy an E-Z Pass which covers transit pretty much everywhere?
In the end, it’s still the same result. Asia gets transit right, we get it wrong. Standardization of all the transit agencies in LA with a fair market distance based fare system is going the be needed if we’re ever going to get transit right.
“The question is would you think it is more simple if you get on a bus going to a destination and not knowing how much your fare would be until you got off?”
How is that any different from not knowing how much it’ll cost to top fill up the tank of the car when you drive into the gas station, or not knowing how much it’ll cost for a box of cereal at Vons as opposed to Ralphs without going to either supermarket?
How do you think people in Asia gotten used to that concept if they’ve been running on a distance based system for decades?
Surely, since you’ve been to Asia and used their transit systems, maybe you can explain with your first hand experience on how you figured it out or have gotten the hang of riding their systems under distance based fares.
Or did you just simply top off the contactless card with money, tap-in/tap-out and not really care how much it cost to get from one place to another? How’s that really any different from loading up TAP with cash value?
How do other transit riders living in countries that run on a distance fares on their buses know how much they should have in cash or how much it’s going deduct from their cards when going from one place to another? Surely there has to be more than simply “not knowing how much it’ll cost until you get off.” Can anyone enlighten us how that works?
“If you live in Santa Monica you might use SM BBB and Metro consistently, but the chances of using a bunch of other systems like Metrolink and Dash would be fairly small and if that were the case, wouldn’t you just buy an E-Z Pass which covers transit pretty much everywhere?”
Or, I can just continue to drive. Driving a car is much simpler than memorizing all these options. Run out of gas in Santa Monica as opposed to Irvine, as opposed to Vegas, still the same procedure to fill up the gas tank: drive up, dip credit card, fill up the tank, off I go.
I also have an app on my smartphone which tells me directions to the cheapest gas station. And at any gas station anywhere in the US, I can use my VISA card. At any gas station anywhere in the US, the price of gas is standardized to $X/gal format for 87 octane regular gas. At any gas station, they usually have stores that allow me to buy food and drinks, and they let me use the restroom if nature calls. Plus, I earn rewards (3% cash back for gas purchases) and discounts at Ralphs when I fill up the gas using my credit card. I earn nothing when I pay by cash or use TAP.
Public transit has none of these conveniences or standardization. I don’t earn rewards or cash back for taking the bus, I end up wasting 30 minutes of my life under the hot summer sun risking heat stroke for waiting for the bus, I can’t eat or drink on the bus, I have to listen to loud Transit TV which annoys the heck out of me, and there’s no standardization going on for payments or fare value across all the different agencies.
Life is just simpler with the car. No need making my life more difficult by using transit agencies which can’t even come to an agreement on how to standardize a simple thing like “how do we charge our customers for the price of taking our trains and buses.”
I would be for distance based fares if they were standardized,
“Surely there has to be more than simply “not knowing how much it’ll cost until you get off.” Can anyone enlighten us how that works?”
You get on from the back of the bus and take a numbered ticket. The ticket is stamped with the bus stop number that you got on. At the front of the bus, there’s a big LCD display that shows what you have to pay when you get off at the next bus stop according corresponding to your numbered ticket (the bus stop that you got on). You can actually get change from the farebox! When you get off, you get off from the front of the bus passing by the bus driver. You drop in the ticket and the fare right there. Did I mention that it gives change?
Such “distance fares for buses” systems have been in production since the 1960s in Japan and they are mass produced to keep costs low. The numbered ticket issuing machine, LCD display, farebox, and change machine package cost about the same amount as a new laptop.
A Japanese company called Lecip produces them and ships them all over the globe to places like Taiwan and Singapore where distance fare buses are the norm. Maybe Metro should start talking with them: http://www.lecip.com/product/product02-00.htm#shori They even do trade shows here in the US at American Public Transportation Association’s EXPO.
Or, if that’s all confusing, they can also find ways to promote more tap-in/tap-out on the buses. That is even cheaper as tap-in/tap-out units are like $10 and they’re mass produced in China. You just load up like $20 or whatever onto your TAP card, tap-in when you get on board the bus and tap-out when alighting, then the fare deducts value of trip based on distance traveled. One just needs to ride buses in Japan, Singapore, Taiwan, Hong Kong, and others on how this works and they work perfectly fine with transit riders and with tourists. Clearly, there isn’t any confusion from American tourists to Tokyo, Singapore, Taipei and Hong Kong when using their transit systems.
“No need making my life more difficult by using transit agencies which can’t even come to an agreement on how to standardize a simple thing like “how do we charge our customers for the price of taking our trains and buses.””
Eventually, the fare structure and system will have to be regulated and standardized. But as it stands now, this isn’t a high priority for any of the transit agencies in LA. For all they care, the board members of each of these agencies are headed by local politicians whose main priority is to be looking after the best interests of their direct constituents, rather than the constituents in other parts of LA. There will never be any coordination or organization unless a bigger authority puts their foot down for all the agencies to follow a guideline.
That’s exactly what happened in Japan in the 1950s. Everybody, including the government, was making up their own rules and fare systems that it became so confusing for anyone to go from one part of the city to another. This bus company uses a flat rate, the other one used distance fares, this one had a different method to pay for it versus another one, a transfer from this bus was ok with to this train but not with that train, the pass was accepted on this bus line but only if you paid a bit more, etc.
Just like you has said, they tried to make it simple, but in the end everyone started making up their own rules that it became confusing for everybody. The whole mess wasn’t resolved until the government stepped in and said, “enough is enough, we’re standardizing the whole thing to distance based fares on a floating fair market value of around X yen/kilometer plus or minus X% adjusted for any inflation, and any big fare raises will have to be go through a lengthy government review process, and that’s final.”
Unless something like that happens here in LA, you’ll just have everyone making up their own fares as they go along.