If you have an ORCA card supplied by your employer, sorting out what you’re going to pay to ride a Metro bus is pretty simple. But, for the rest of us, King County’s fare system is, as the Seattle Transit Blog says, unfair and complex.
Metro is rolling out a survey to help shape a proposal planned to get in front of the county council by June. You can add your thoughts in the first planned survey here by April 7th. You can read what the experts at STB have to say about the plan and what is behind the effort to change the system here:
The background materials presented to the Advisory Committee convened for this project show that Metro is primarily focused on two goals: in the short term, potential elimination of zone and peak surcharges, and in the longer term, moving gingerly toward cashlessness and/or universal off-board payment. Please take the survey, and we’ll keep you updated with additional feedback opportunities as the project progresses. You may also email comments to Metro’s DeAnna Martin.
Given the tight turnaround time to get the proposal in front of the King County Council, a second survey on options for how to best shape a new fare structure will follow in April.
Metro is also holding public meetings on the fare review. The next is April 4th at King Street Station from 3:30 to 5:30 PM.
You can learn more at kingcounty.gov.
If Metro really wants to go bold, how about this: One dollar every time you board – all ages, all zones, all times. No transfers or transfer credit (except for Orca Lift cardholders – this would be the only benefit conferred by the card). Someone with expertise will have to do the math, but my gut feeling is that the increased ridership resulting from such extreme simplification and fare reduction would more than make up for the revenue loss on each individual fare, as it would encourage using the bus for short hops.