Day Passes will no longer be sold on Metro buses starting Sunday, July 15. Instead, you’ll be able to add up to $20 in Stored Value to your TAP card.
Board at the front of the bus and tell the operator that you would like to add Stored Value to your TAP card. All transactions will be cash only. Please note, operators will not be able to provide change.
TAP cards can also be purchased on all buses for $2.
With your TAP card, you’ll be able to take advantage of two hours of free transfers to other Metro lines.
Day Passes will remain available for purchase at:
- TAP vending machines
- Online at taptogo.net
- By calling 866.TAPTOGO
- At Metro Customer Centers
- At over 400 TAP vendor locations throughout L.A. County
Categories: Policy & Funding, Projects
After reading all these comments, I think Metro should be taken over by Transport for London as they have their system together and organized and they have a fully functional smart card, the Oystercard, in place.
Feels like a penalty. This sucks.
Why can’t you guys just have done something like Muni. Give cash paying customers a transfer for 90 minuets and implement all door boarding on all buses. And tap customers a two hour period.
Wow! I’m shocked that this is such a big deal!
When Metro changed the fare structure a few years ago and got rid of transfers and added the 2 hour transfer wind, I thought day passes would become obsolete. You have to make at least four one-way linked trips per day just to break even on a day pass (4 trips x $1.75 = $7.00, same as day pass). How many people make five or more linked transit trips in a day?
I think there are a lot of people who started using day passes when they were a good deal for commuters who need to transfer to get to work. In those days a day pass gave you a discount with just two one-way trips that included transfers (4 boardings x $1.50 = $6.00, less than $5.00 day pass). They probably still think that day passes give them a discount.
I think maybe this change is precipitated by exactly what you said – not many people buy day passes anymore because of the free transfers. You’d literally have to spend all day on the bus. I still buy some occasionally, because my primary line is the Silver Line and that costs $2.50 per pop, so it is worth it if I get on it 3 or more times in a day.
Yet another arbitrary and capricious change from Metro. What is wrong with you people? Why make it harder on tourists, or those of us who don’t live near a TAP card sales point? And your bus drivers NEVER know how to process these purchases. It seems like you design the system to fail.
[…] Metro No Longer Selling Day Passes Aboard Buses (The Source) […]
Why does Metro continue to half step on changes like this. Implement it completely (that includes removing the option to buy day passes from TVMs) or don’t make any changes at all!!
“TAP cards can also be purchased on all buses for $2.”
Wait, what?? Seriously?? So what is the point of removing the option to buy a day pass if not only will that option still be available elsewhere, but this new option adds EXTRA dwell time yet again by allowing sale of TAP cards on board and option for Stored Value??
This is actually crappier than BBB removing the option to buy transfers with cash. At least I can try to understand the logic behind that. This just outright doesn’t make any sense.
Actually, I think part of the reason here is actually to REDUCE dwell time. You can buy a TAP card for $2 on the bus because that’s 2 one-dollar bills plus whatever fare that is required (most likely 4 one-dollar bills). But a day pass requires a 5-dollar bill and 2 one-dollar bills, or worse yet, watching someone feed 7 bills into the farebox while a nice line of people queue up outside the front door of the bus and people skip the fare by going through the back door (because the operator is too busy to notice). These are all transactions that could be accomplished at a TVM (and in fact buying a TAP card is cheaper at a machine), yet I see this happen every day on the Silver Line at El Monte Station. I don’t know what the problem is with people and the TVMs. They’re easy to use, they take cash, and unlike bus drivers, they speak your language. Maybe this is an attempt to drag people to them, kicking and screaming.
Sometimes a tvm is not conveniently located to your bus stop. And living paycheck to paycheck, you don’t have time to find one befire heading to work in the morning.
I agree, on the Silver Line cash payment should be banned but it isn’t. It also prevents proper enforcement of the fare payment on the line if people pay cash.
A lot of people aren’t aware that store value allows you to transfer between mta buses and trains for 2 hours after 1st tap.
If stored value can be added on tap cards on the bus then why can’t passes be now? What possible technical limitation is there to this? It’s can’t about revenue (or is it?) because day passes can still be bought elsewhere. It’s just another way Metro is treating bus riders as second class. It’s also another example of Metro’s inexperience as a transit agency and their reluctance to emulate best practices around the world… Boy oh boy… Also, many people question why there is no round trip fare option at TVMs. Again this is something other transit systems like the MTA in New York have offered forever.
If I have $20.00 of stored value on a Tap card, tap it once to get on the first metro bus, and then tap it again an hour later to get on a second metro bus, will the machine automatically know that my second tap should be FREE (because of the two hours of free transfers)? Or will it charge me $1.75 for the second bus?
The suggestion is to use stored value, but it also says that we can take advantage of two hours of free transfers to other Metro lines. How does that work? For example, if there is $20.00 of stored value loaded onto my Tap card, and I tap once to get on a Metro bus, then $.175 is deducted. If I use my Tap card again an hour later to transfer to a second Metro bus, will the machine know that it is a FREE transfer tap and not a tap that should deduct another $1.75 from my stored value?
Yes, the TAP card itself keeps a record of recent use and will notice that you already paid the full fare within the prior 2 hours. It will not deduct anything further.
Except at 7th/Metro. ‘Til this day I still get charged twice if I leave the station then return to TRANSFER to another line.
The main TAP validators are not setup to know that I had previously rode, say, the Expo Line from Downtown Santa Monica, get off at 7th/Metro for a cup of joe, then continue on the Red Line to NoHo. Since the TAP validators don’t know that this is my intent I still get charged twice because it thinks I’m trying to get back on the Expo Line.
It knows. I don’t know how, but it knows, and it’s awesome. Well actually, I assume there’s some kind of wireless cell phone type thing involved. This works for any transfers within those two hours except for taking the same line in the opposite direction (they don’t want to give you a free return trip).
Yeah exactly how you explained it works you tap once and it deducts $1.75 and show you yoir remaining balance on your card when you tap it on another bus or rail the machine will read $0.00 deducted
Stored Value is a joke. You can’t store any amount. You have to buy an one trip fare of $1.75 minimum or pay much more like $5, 10, 20. You can’t add a few quarters to make-up for a partial amount for a trip costing $1.75. I wish Stored Value will work for the new Parking Lots. They prefer cash or credit cards instead. It doesn’t bring confidence to Stored Value.
On the bus you could load any amount, not the fixed amounts. You can also type in whatever dollar amount you want to the penny when you load on taptogo.net. Now I question if drivers have been properly trained to add amounts to a card and whether people will lose money because the rider or driver didn’t do things in the right order. I know I’ve gotten on buses several times, where someone didn’t do their role properly and gotten the “emergency day pass” of a specially punched Metro to Muni transfer. Then people caught on to it, that was reversed, and I learned to load day passes at a station if I needed them (you can load multiple day passes at a time and not activate them).
Why make things less convenient for us bus riders? 🙁
Just another way to make peple pay more. ImIsorry but LA Metro is really greedy.
Is there a function that the fares paid on a day can be applied to the day pass cost when a day pass is bought at a TVM?
Hi Stephen,
At this time fare caps are not available.
Thank you,
Anna Chen
Writer, The Source
Are there plans for fare caps in the future?
Hi Ron,
I wouldn’t rule it out as a possibility forever but there’s no plans that I know of.
Anna Chen
Writer, The Source
Hi Anna,
Would you happen to know if implementing fare caps is a technical issue or a regulatory issue? That is, can Metro just decide to add caps if they want, or does it require the entire process of a fare structure change?
Hi,
That’s a good question, and I actually don’t know the answer to that. But I’ll try to find out!
Anna Chen
Writer, The Source
Will the seamless Metro to Muni transfers roll out at the same time or will they be implemented at a later date?
Hi,
They’ll be rolling out at the same time, the announcement will be made a little later this week.
Thank you,
Anna Chen
Writer, The Source