SEPTA’S smart-card plan is greeted with questions

SEPTA unveiled plans for its new "smart card" fare system Friday to a public that was, by turns, enthusiastic, skeptical, and confused.

Scores of riders, industry executives, and the merely curious showed up at SEPTA's Center City headquarters to watch a presentation on the new system and talk to SEPTA officials.

SEPTA expects to award a contract this summer for the new electronic fare-payment system, but passengers won't be able to abandon their tokens, tickets, and passes for two to three years, when the system is expected to be installed. When the system is in place, passengers will be able to pay their fares with credit cards, debit cards, cell phones, or electronic SEPTA cards.

For most of SEPTA's passengers - those who ride buses, subways and trolleys - the switch will be relatively easy. New card-readers will simply replace old turnstiles or fare-boxes.

But on Regional Rail, which accounts for 13 percent of SEPTA's riders and provides 25 percent of its revenue, the transformation may bring major changes.

SEPTA is considering charging rail fares only in one direction and installing subway-style gates and turnstiles at five Philadelphia stations: Suburban Station, Market East, 30th Street, University City, and Temple University.

Rail-passenger advocates have argued against those changes, saying they could encourage widespread fare evasion by riders who could train into Philadelphia free and find another way home.

Frequent rail passenger Douglas Diehl of Drexel Hill said he could envision riding free from Trenton on SEPTA's train and then returning on the cheaper NJ Transit River Line. He said he got conflicting answers from SEPTA representatives Friday about that possibility. And Diehl said rail passengers would not be happy with the proposed gates in Center City stations.

"Regional Rail passengers are a different breed of rider," he said. "And now SEPTA is going to treat them like subway riders and make them go through turnstiles?"

SEPTA's chief of new payment technologies, John McGee, said the Regional Rail changes were not firm.

"It's a point of discussion," he said. "We want to walk with people about what are the shortcomings." He said the new fare system offered a "chance to do something different" with the rail network "in terms of public policy and operational efficiency."

West Philadelphia resident Johanna Heine, 30, said she was looking forward to using the new fare system to make her regular trips on the Route 10 trolley.

She said the current system for buying and using tokens "is not very user-friendly."

Her husband, Ben Freid, 32, said the new system would mean "I won't have to go running around to buy tokens, and I won't have to deal with the people selling tokens."

Steven Sawadisavi, 26, of Narberth, said he expected the new system would be more convenient than his current monthly pass.

"Now I have to get a different card each month, and sometimes I've found I don't have the right card," he said.

Douglas Brown of Penrose Park said, "I'm trying to comprehend it. I'm trying to figure out if it will be an improvement for me."

Brown, who uses a monthly pass to commute by train on the Airport Line and to travel by bus and subway around the city, said he was "not sure how it would be easier" to use the new system.

The new electronic system will mean the demise of the cashiers at subway stations. Their job is not to make change but to accept cash payments from riders. Those workers will "metamorphose to customer service positions," SEPTA general manager Joseph Casey said Friday.

Casey said SEPTA needs "more outreach" with its passengers to explain the changes that are coming. To that end, SEPTA plans to make its fare-system presentation to regional audiences in the next few weeks, spokesman Richard Maloney said.

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