Meeting Summary Report

SEPTA New Payment Technologies Fare Policy Advisory Group - August, 2011

The Economy League of Greater Philadelphia convened two meetings with New Payment Technologies (NPT) stakeholders to offer guidance to SEPTA staff and Board guidance on key capital and fare policy decisions impacting fare payment on Regional Rail, and facilitate the development of design principles and concepts for fare collection operations under NPT.

Participants included officials from the City of Philadelphia, Bucks, Chester, Delaware and Montgomery Counties, Pennsylvania Department of Transportation, Delaware Valley Regional Planning Commission, Greater Philadelphia Chamber of Commerce, Delaware Valley Association of Rail Passengers, SEPTA Citizen Advisory Committee, SEPTA Youth Advisory Committee, and the University of Pennsylvania.

The Stakeholders outlined the following guiding principles:

Make the SEPTA system easier and simpler for customers to navigate and use

Improve payment convenience for SEPTA customers

Protect SEPTA revenues

Generate the means to repay the loan that enabled SEPTA to move forward with the New Payment Technology project

The Advisory Committee identified the following key priorities for the new system:

Convenience/Ease of use (including marginal and infrequent passengers)

Uniformity and equity for riders

Revenues, including both cost control and revenue security

Ridership increase

Three fare payment options were evaluated: continue the current system, install ticket vending equipment at all 154 Regional Rail stations, or install farelines at the downtown stations.
Advisory Group Recommendation: Install farelines at downtown stations.

The next issue discussed was how to use the farelines to best collect Regional Rail fares. Two options were considered: collect only in the outbound direction of travel or collect in each direction of travel.
Advisory Group Recommendation: Collect fares in each direction of travel.

The next consideration was how to collect the fare for distance actually traveled. To establish the default zone, two options were considered: identify the zone having the greatest number of customers or the zone representing the furthest travel distance.
Advisory Group Recommendation: The default zone should be defined by the zone representing the furthest distance of travel.