El passengers who use Transit Cards to pay for their ride could see their fares rise by 25 cents next year.
Customers will be able to avoid the increases by switching to the Chicago Card, which is shaped like a credit card and used by touching the card to the turnstile. But transit advocates say the proposed dual fare system is unfair to the poor.
Under a budget proposal submitted by Frank Kruesi, the president of the Chicago Transit Authority, fares for all rail passengers who pay by cash and Transit Card will rise to $2 up from $1.75.
Bus passengers who pay with cash will also see their fares rise to $2 and the CTA will stop issuing transfers to cash-paying customers. The CTA last raised fares in 2004, when they rose by 25 cents.
When the CTA had problems balancing this year’s budget, it threatened to cut about 36 percent of all service, including the Purple Line Express, in July 2005. The state provided funds to prevent the cuts from taking place, but the CTA needs about another $49 million to balance its budget for 2006. Some of that shortfall is due to rising fuel costs. Fuel will constitute $48 million for 2006, more than three times the 1999 fuel costs, according to CTA documents.
Increasing cash fares to $2 would make the cost of using Chicago public transportation among the highest in the nation. Rail and bus passengers pay $2 in New York and Philadelphia. But it would be much higher than the $1.50 fare on San Francisco’s MUNI, or Boston’s T, where people pay just 90 cents to ride the local bus.
None of the fare increases will apply to passengers who pay with the Chicago Card. Unlike the Transit Card, which is sold at machines in stations, the Chicago Card can only be bought online, through the mail, at several retail locations, by calling CTA or at their Chicago headquarters. Riders can then refill the cards at stations.
“This is not an equitable plan,” said Jacqueline Leavy, executive director of Chicago-based Neighborhood Capital Budget Group. “This will balance the budget off the backs of the working poor and people who use cash.”
Passengers who live from paycheck to paycheck often do not have Internet access or bank accounts, so it would be difficult for them to buy a Chicago Card, Leavy said.
CTA charges passengers $5 to buy a new Chicago Card, though it will waive this fee from December to March if fares go up.
The advantage of the Chicago Card over the Transit Card is that it allows customers to board twice as fast, CTA spokeswoman Robyn Ziegler wrote in an e-mail.
The end of 25-cent transfers for cash-paying customers is the wrong solution to CTA’s budget problems, said Rick Martin, the convener of Evanston’s Transportation Future. The group has advocated reforms to the way transit is funded in the Chicago area.
“What they have now is great – being able to transfer from one mode to another,” Martin said. “If they do anything to make that less convenient, that’s not good.”
Dan Evans, 22, who uses the El to commute from his home in Chicago to attend Northwestern’s School of Continuing Studies, where he is a first-year student, said he will likely get the Chicago Card, even though it would be much easier to pay with cash.
“It will save me in the long run,” Evans said. “A little inconvenience today is probably worth the $100 a year I will save.”
Reach Greg Hafkin at [email protected].
