Thursday the BART Board voted to postpone an inflation-based fare increase for people who use single-ride tickets, costing the agency more than $2 million that could go to cleaner cars and more reliable service. They could buy an air conditioning system for their control room, for example, so that the trains could run on hot days!
And just to be clear: it’s not that we love fare increases. Fares should never rise more than inflation, but they should keep up with inflation so that the agency’s revenue stream is reliable. And BART’s per trip fare structure for everyone except fast pass users (a scheme that Muni pays for, by the way) penalizes people who want to rely on transit all the time. If BART wants to give a fare break, create a systemwide monthly pass system. That would drastically increase ridership and therefore improve our environment.
Click here to see the SF Chronicle article on the topic.
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