New transit fare structure coming
The ARTM has come up with a simplified transit fare system reducing the current dizzying 700 fare types to a mere 100. It’s meant to begin next July.
Possibly sooner than that, the longstanding situation that you can take the metro from Montreal to Laval or Longueuil on a regular pass or ticket, but you need to pay extra to return to the city, is going to be levelled out so Montrealers will have to pony up as well.
Max 02:32 on 2020-12-22 Permalink
Only 100? Must you make me laugh so hard, transit administrative types? C’mon already, you dumb fucks.
DeWolf 13:17 on 2020-12-22 Permalink
The STM offers 10 different fare types (single ticket, book of 10 tickets, evening pass, weekend pass, etc.). Not particularly complicated. But there are 15 transit agencies in Greater Montreal, so if each has a similar abundance of offerings, it can very quickly get up to 100 options.
These different fare types are quite beneficial for regular users. My biggest problem is that there is no cash-value option for the Opus card. If I take the metro to Longueuil, I need to walk over to a machine and load a ticket onto my Opus card in order to take an RTL bus, which is such a dumb procedure. Instead I should be able to carry around a certain value on my card (let’s say $10) which would be deducted every time I use my card on a transit agency for which I don’t have a pass. That’s how it works with virtually every transit system around the world. Why it isn’t an option here continues to mystify me.
DeWolf 13:19 on 2020-12-22 Permalink
A more local example of what I’m talking about: if I put $50 on my Presto card, I can take the subway in Toronto, hop on a GO Train to Hamilton and take the bus there, all without having to load any special tickets or passes onto the card.
Blork 14:30 on 2020-12-22 Permalink
They can design things like that in Toronto and elsewhere because they have this basic concept of “what can we do to make this system better for our users?”
But in Quebec it’s more complicated. Everything from street signs to transit tickets has to go through the following battery of usability checks:
What can we do to make this system better for our Francophone users?
What can we do to make this system seem like it is only for Francophone users to our francophone users, while still making it available to our Anglophone users, but without making it seem like we are in any way giving an inch to our Anglophone users?
What can we do to make this system better for secular users without writing it down anywhere so we can’t be accused of discrimination or systemic racism?
What can we do to make this system better for the 15 different unions involved, all of which think they are the most important of the unions and therefore should have the last word on it, without letting them know that none of them have the last word on it?
Now pass this dossier over to Serge because I think he’s watched a couple of videos about usability on Youtube.
Ant6n 14:33 on 2020-12-22 Permalink
Cash based card systems is definitely not how it works in all places of the world. The best practice is to encourage as many ppl as possible on monthly fares, and if you go outside your zone then you buy an extension ticket. On the other end of the spectrum is having a smart phone app option and pay as you go. Some allow tapping with credit cards.
nau 14:54 on 2020-12-22 Permalink
The other obvious improvement for people who had cash on their card rather than a monthly pass would be to automatically deduct the least amount applicable. So instead of one having to guess in advance how many times one might use transit on a particular weekend, the system stops charging you once you’ve paid the cost of a weekend pass.
PatrickC 15:05 on 2020-12-22 Permalink
Here in Los Angeles County, where there are also multiple transit agencies, the TAP card system is also cash-based, with appropriate fares deducted on transfer to another system. You can top up your card balance by paying online. The main exception is the Metrolink commuter train, where fares depend on distance traveled. Metrolink tickets are separate, but have a QR code that lets you transfer to bus or light rail, and if you have a return ticket, to take the bus back to the Metrolink station.
Daniel D 15:15 on 2020-12-22 Permalink
I suspect one of the bottlenecks here is OPUS. The system appears to have way too many limitations for it to provide the level of flexibility needed for a region as complex as Greater Montreal. London’s Oyster or Tokyo’s Suica are good case studies on how to implement this kind of thing properly.
The most egregious example of OPUS’s limitations is having to be sent a USB card writer by the STM in order to charge up your card remotely, a problem London solved over a decade ago.
I’m truly hoping they’ll take this opportunity to retire OPUS and replace it with something better spec’d and more future-proofed, hopefully a digital card which can just exist on your phone.
David Senik 18:27 on 2020-12-22 Permalink
Hi Ant6n, has anyone ever tried a system whereby you can swipe your credit card for each individual trip you take? I have this idea where you would get charged single rides but the system would be smart enough to remember your credit card and as such would stop charging once the amount you spend in one month equals the cost of a monthly pass. This way causal users would pay for only what they use and regular users don’t have to go to the trouble of getting a monthly pass every month and still benefit from the monthly pass pricing. Has it ever been tried?
azrhey 19:44 on 2020-12-22 Permalink
heck… when i lived in teh London 2 years ago I justed used my phone and google pay everytime and “it” calculated how much I needed to, when I was done for the day, week, month, etc. No card ( but you could that with your Oyster if that was your jam ) not calculations. Dad came to visit from Montreal and he used his phone with google pay as well , and all the way from Gatwick too, so not just TfL ….
moving back to Canada was like travel back in time when it comes to public transport ( also bike paths, but I’m not opening that can of worms right now
DeWolf 01:30 on 2020-12-23 Permalink
Anton, of course most transit agencies offer passes, but my point was that they offer passes as well as the cash value option. If you use an Oyster card, you can buy a pass, or you can top it up with cash value. Same for OV, Suica, Myki, Octopus, Compass, Presto, T-money, Easycard. etc. Opus seems like one of the few smart card systems that doesn’t allow users to add cash value.
Also, are zones really best practice? I can’t think of any zone-based systems in East Asia, which is the part of the world with the highest rate of transit use.
ant6n 16:18 on 2020-12-23 Permalink
You won’t find many cash-card based systems in Central Europe, if any (Germany, Switzerland, Netherlands, Austria…). East Asians have high transit use, but it’s despite their fare systems, not because of it (I don’t mean the fare payment system, but rather the fare structure). For example in Japan, transit is actually quite expensive and in many places fares aren’t integrated between different agencies in the same city — so they use the same money card, but you still end up paying multiple tickets.
@David
Oyster card does something like that – it tops out at the day pass. When I was there as a visitor, I did find it somewhat intransparent, money just flew off that card and you quickly ended up at the max daily rate. As a visitor, you’re in some way encouraged to only take buses, because their daily rate is lower than if you also ride the underground. Odd incentives.
DeWolf 15:38 on 2020-12-24 Permalink
You’re absolutely right about Japan, and Bangkok suffers from exactly the same problems (high fares and lack of integration between agencies). But I was thinking about Hong Kong, Taipei, Seoul and mainland Chinese cities which seem to be able to keep fares low while employing the same distance-based fare structure as in Japan.