SMART bus to raise fares.

[Danny]

Starting December 1st 2009, the SMART bus board of directors have officially raised its regular fares rates:

FsaaaIXE

FARE INCREASE SCHEDULE
[[Effective December 1, 2009)
FIXED ROUTE CURRENT RATE NEW RATE
fivxed

Regular Base Fare now $ 1.50 Dec. 1st $ 2.00
Regular Park & Ride now$ 2.00 Dec. 1st $ 2.50
SMART Transfer now $ 0.25 Dec.1st No Change

DDOT Transfer now DDOT Transfer Dec. 1st DDOT Transfer plus $ 0.50
Seniors & Disabled now $ 0.50 Dec. 1st No Change
Seniors & Disabled, Park & Ride $ 1.00 No Change


Senior & Disabled Transfer now FREE Dec. 1st No Change
DDOT ADA Transfer now DDOT Transfer Dec. 1st No Change
Student & Youth now $1.00 Dec .1st No Change



Student & Youth Park & Ride now $1.50 Dec.1st No Change

Student & Youth Transfer now $ 0.25 Dec. 1st No Change

CONNECTOR SERVICES:
CONNECTOR SERVICES CURRENT RATE NEW RATE
Full Fare now $ 2.00 Dec.1st $ 4.00
Seniors & Disabled now $ 1.00 Dec.1st No Change


Full Fare/Youth Transfer to Fixed Route now $ 0.25 Dec.1st No Change
Senior & Disabled Transfer to Fixed Route now Free Dec. 1st No Change
ADA [[FTA Double Regular Fixed Fare) now $ 3.00 Dec.1st No Change
Job Express now $ 0.50 Dec 1st $ 1.00


Metro Lift/SMART ADA Transfer Metro Lift Transfer No Change

P ASS TYPE CURRENT PRICE NEW PRICE
SMART 31 Day Rolling Passes



· Seniors & Disabled now $ 17.00 Dec. 1st No Change
· Students & Youth now $ 33.00 Dec.1st No Change
· Regular Base now$ 47.00 Dec. 1st $ 66.00
· Park & Ride now $ 66.00 Dec. 1st $ 82.00
SMART/DDOT Regional Pass now $49.50 Dec. 1st Pass plus $ 0.50 [[per ride)
· Regional Supplemental Pass [[$.50) now n/a Dec 1st. $20.00


The Regional Pass is going to REALLY hurt some passengers. Paying 50 cents a ride; you might have depend on those value cards for now on.

So much for public transit.

D ROUTE CURRENT RATE NEW RATE

[Tig3rzhark]

Starting December 1st 2009, the SMART bus board of directors have officially raised its regular fares rates:

FsaaaIXE

FARE INCREASE SCHEDULE
[[Effective December 1, 2009)
FIXED ROUTE CURRENT RATE NEW RATE
fivxed

Regular Base Fare now $ 1.50 Dec. 1st $ 2.00
Regular Park & Ride now$ 2.00 Dec. 1st $ 2.50
SMART Transfer now $ 0.25 Dec.1st No Change

DDOT Transfer now DDOT Transfer Dec. 1st DDOT Transfer plus $ 0.50
Seniors & Disabled now $ 0.50 Dec. 1st No Change
Seniors & Disabled, Park & Ride $ 1.00 No Change


Senior & Disabled Transfer now FREE Dec. 1st No Change
DDOT ADA Transfer now DDOT Transfer Dec. 1st No Change
Student & Youth now $1.00 Dec .1st No Change



Student & Youth Park & Ride now $1.50 Dec.1st No Change

Student & Youth Transfer now $ 0.25 Dec. 1st No Change

CONNECTOR SERVICES:
CONNECTOR SERVICES CURRENT RATE NEW RATE
Full Fare now $ 2.00 Dec.1st $ 4.00
Seniors & Disabled now $ 1.00 Dec.1st No Change


Full Fare/Youth Transfer to Fixed Route now $ 0.25 Dec.1st No Change
Senior & Disabled Transfer to Fixed Route now Free Dec. 1st No Change
ADA [[FTA Double Regular Fixed Fare) now $ 3.00 Dec.1st No Change
Job Express now $ 0.50 Dec 1st $ 1.00


Metro Lift/SMART ADA Transfer Metro Lift Transfer No Change

P ASS TYPE CURRENT PRICE NEW PRICE
SMART 31 Day Rolling Passes



· Seniors & Disabled now $ 17.00 Dec. 1st No Change
· Students & Youth now $ 33.00 Dec.1st No Change
· Regular Base now$ 47.00 Dec. 1st $ 66.00
· Park & Ride now $ 66.00 Dec. 1st $ 82.00
SMART/DDOT Regional Pass now $49.50 Dec. 1st Pass plus $ 0.50 [[per ride)
· Regional Supplemental Pass [[$.50) now n/a Dec 1st. $20.00


The Regional Pass is going to REALLY hurt some passengers. Paying 50 cents a ride; you might have depend on those value cards for now on.

So much for public transit.

D ROUTE CURRENT RATE NEW RATE

I knew this shit was going to happen. I could deal with it since I have my bike as a alternative. So far, no word at the Customer Information meetings on whether DDOT will follow suit with raising fares. However it only seems to be a matter of time.

And with SMART charging an extra .50 even if you have a Regional Pass, just charge $50 for the pass and let that be the end of it.

[Retroit]

No offense to your financial situation, but is an extra 50 cents going to be that much of a hardship? If you're unemployed and have no income, how often do you need to use the bus?

[digitalvision]

Actually, these costs are more in line with the rest of the country. NYC is $2.25 for a regular bus fare, $5.50 for an express.

It's $1.50 in Boston, but they have two express route classes at $3.50 and $5.00. One could argue many times SMART acts as an express bus with it's limited stops in the city.

It's $5 extra per week, assuming 2 trips a day. It's not gonna kill you. We all talk about how there needs to be more money for transit, but as always, when it comes to YOUR pocketbook, there's bitching and moaning. Same with taxpayers.

I hope that it can help improve service, and wonder how much extra money it will raise. I also think IF we got our dream of express bus service, that it would cost like those other cities.

[Bearinabox]

No offense to your financial situation, but is an extra 50 cents going to be that much of a hardship? If you're unemployed and have no income, how often do you need to use the bus?

Part of the appeal of having a regional pass is that you don't have to worry about having exact change on you all the time. It also reduces boarding time since it takes less time to swipe a card than to dig out coins and throw them into the farebox. I'm not opposed to a fare increase per se, but I think the increase should be factored into the monthly cost of the pass and not paid at the farebox. Requiring additional fare with the regional pass is part of what doomed DDOT's express routes, IMO.

[Danny]

Wait til Saturday September 26 when D-DOT changes it bus time schedules. You all might be home at a certian time during evenings.

[Tig3rzhark]

It almost defeats the purpose for having a regional pass if you have to pay .50 extra for one system and nothing for another. During the service change meetings for DDOT, people have suggested that fares be raised to decrease the amount of cuts that were going to be made.

Hopefully DDOT will raise there fares as well.

[hudkina]

I don't see how anyone can complain about bus fares, especially considering the alternatives. Even paying $4 per bus ride is nothing compared to paying $70 for a cab ride or the extra costs that go along with owning a car. I'm sure $130 for an unlimited monthly pass or $35 for an unlimited weekly pass isn't going to kill anyone. Even if someone is working full-time at the minimum wage, $130 is only about 10% of their monthly income.

Paying as you go would cost about $8 round trip per day, the weekly pass would cost about $7 round trip per workday, and the monthly pass would cost about $6 round trip per workday. For those who use the bus frequently, but not on a daily basis, they could offer passes on a per trip basis. For example, $40 for 12 trips, or $20 for 6 trips.

Granted, the higher fares should go along with better service, i.e. routes with higher frequencies and more information stations at select bus stops.

[epiphany]

The whole point of buying a monthy pass is to avoid paying individual fares... How ridiculous! I like buying the bus pass because I can allocate "x" amount of dollars every month to bus fare instead of having to guess how much I may or may not use the bus. Also, it really seems to make things overly complicated. If a person with a regional pass needs to transfer to another bus, as a pass holder will they still have to pay an additional 50 cents for each bus they transfer to? That could get very expensive. How do they plan on handling pass holder transfers?

And to those of you that think that adding 50 cents to the cost of the bus fare and passes won't hurt those who ride it, you are absolutely wrong. There are many employed people in Detroit that rely on public transportation to get to jobs, and while 50 cents may not seem like much to someone making a decent salary, to some it is already difficult enough to pay regular fare because of the fact that there are so few good paying jobs in the area. It will also make it even harder for the unemployed to find jobs.

Also, as a student that buys the monthly regional pass to get around to do literally everything this will make things very difficult for me as well. Having to transport myself between school and work will probably get way too costly to afford with the new rate increase. The inevitable cutback on DDOT bus service hours and routes will probably kill me. I rely on my bike to get to a lot of places because sometimes that's just faster, but when the winter storms and bad weather and rain hits I'm pretty much screwed if I'm no longer living in an area where DDOT travels...

[professorscott]

Regarding the extra $0.50 with the regional pass, a couple points. First of all, you can buy a supplemental pass for $20 then you use both passes when you ride and avoid the extra $0.50. So if you're just worried about carrying change, there you go.

Second, the reason for the fare gymnastics is that SMART is raising fares and DDOT, so far, is not. I anticipate DDOT will now start discussing a fare increase. Neither system has changed its base fare in a long time, and costs are and have been increasing. Once each system charges $2.00 for a base fare, then they can just sell the regional pass for $70 instead of $50, and all the extra nonsense will disappear.

We must remember the essential problem with transit in metro Detroit is money. Our farebox recovery ratio - farebox revenue divided by system costs - is one of the lowest in the country, for both DDOT and SMART. With such a low recovery ratio, it's hard to get the FTA interested in any of our projects. While we do need a better source of local funding than the SMART millage and the City general fund, getting more money from the users is a necessary first step. Unpleasant, but necessary.

It's good to know that SMART is looking to Oakland County for county-wide support. What might bite them is the grumbling in northern Macomb County. Everywhere else that people pay into the SMART system, they either have a fixed route bus line in their community or within a mile of the community. Throughout northern Macomb County, people are paying the SMART millage, but getting pretty close to zero in return. If anyone from SMART reads this, I would consider fixing the Macomb County problem before hoping for great things from Oakland.

I've heard all the arguments, by the way, about why it is the way it is in northern Macomb. Doesn't matter. People are paying for a loaf of bread, and not getting any bread.

[hudkina]

But in the same sense I'm paying for M-59 with my tax dollars and I've never once driven on that road. Just because we pay taxes toward something we might not necessarily use doesn't mean we shouldn't do so for the benefit of society.

[professorscott]

Hudinka, that's a little silly. You are paying for every road, in some sense, but you are not paying a dedicated tax, which appears on your tax bill, which specifically says "M-59". Someone in, say, Armada Township or the City of Richmond has a line that says "SMART millage" on their property tax bill, an itemized amount which they pay directly into the SMART system, and for they get pretty close to zero in return.

I live in a county with a county library tax. Now, there is no library in my township, but there is one close by that I can use, and I do use it. But I would be furious if I had to pay the library tax and there was no library even accessible to me.

[hudkina]

It's really not that different. 1/5 of Michigan's population lives in Wayne County, but 1/5 of state road taxes don't go to Wayne County. A huge chunk of my tax dollars go to pay for roads in areas that I will probably never visit. That doesn't mean that I should complain about my tax dollars going to pay for expansions of M-53 or M-59. I'm perfectly fine with paying my dues to society for the benefit of everyone.

Those who live in northern Macomb County might not necessarily use the bus system, but that doesn't mean that they should be exempt from paying their fair share. In the same sense that tax dollars streaming in from southern Macomb County are paying for infrastructure in northern Macomb County, the people in northern Macomb County should be paying their fair share for services that might be more beneficial for people in southern Macomb County. After all if rural areas were only allowed to use locally generated tax dollars they wouldn't even be able to afford their infrastructure.

It's the most ironic thing about American political culture. The people who are most anti-tax/anti-government tend to live in areas that are the MOST heavily subsidized by taxes and government...