RTA looks to brave new world of paying fares

Chicago Card, Transit Card, Commuter Club Cards, 10-Ride tickets, weekend passes, monthly passes - there's a bewildering variety of choices out there for paying fares on the CTA, Metra and Pace.

So the idea of having a streamlined system that would allow riders to use the equivalent of credit cards to access all three transit systems got the attention of Regional Transportation Authority leaders Thursday.

New York City Transit official Paul Korczak described a pilot project using so-called contactless smartcards on the Lexington Avenue subway line, which travels through Manhattan's Upper East Side.

A smartcard is embedded with a memory chip that can store a significant amount of data. As commuters on the Lexington subway pass through the turnstiles, they can wave the cards at a device that reads the information and allows them through. The cards are available at participating banks.

New York hopes to extend the program to buses soon. Reaction from commuters has been positive, Korczak said, adding the agency has increased ridership and cut administrative costs.

Similar programs are used in Europe and Great Britain, planners said.

"It moves from a proprietary system where the CTA is like a bank and becomes like a Target or Starbucks," RTA senior deputy executive director of planning and regional programs Leanne Redden said.

The CTA is already moving in that direction with its Chicago Cards and Transit Cards, officials noted. The concept would allow users to manage their accounts online. Another feature is that the technology would be able to deduct applicable discounts for users.

RTA officials said they wanted to encourage development of a similar system.

"It would be worth doing an audit of the cost (of what) agencies spend on managing cash and checks," Chairman Jim Reilly said, adding that the program would save money.