We’ve all stood in line behind a person searching their wallet for loose change to board a bus or trolley car, counting out quarters and dollar bills, and we’ve cursed the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority’s payment system that allows for some to hold up the line while others board with the quick tap of a card. But there’s a reason we still have those cash readers at the front — for people who can’t pay through a bank account.
The MBTA exists to serve all Bay State passengers and commuters, regardless of income status or ability to pay with credit or debit. But a proposed fare collection system may be exclusionary to those who pay exclusively with cash.
The MBTA has begun holding public meetings to hear out a better way to collect money from passengers, according to WGBH. They’re moving forward on a proposal to install an automated fare collection system within the next two years, which has some residents concerned because cash will no longer be accepted on buses or trolley cars.
Public transit should inherently exist to provide an option for low-income commuters who can’t afford to drive their own car or be driven by someone else. If the T changes entirely to a cashless system, especially on buses, it’ll become not necessarily a resource for the wealthy, but a resource for the financially sound — and that’s dangerous.
Where will the people whose livelihoods depend on this means of transportation turn? What impact will this have on equity in our city if mobility is a privilege reserved for people who already have other options?
Attempts to upgrade the T system shouldn’t be squashed immediately just because they present a change we’re not used to. Modernizing the fare collection system could allow passengers to board faster and make commutes faster, T officials said to WGBH. This is what many commuters have been asking for.
But if modernizing the system is pushing out the people who rely most on public transportation — people who can’t call a Lyft on their phone when they’re late to work — it’s not worth it. We can all wait a few extra minutes for people to insert cash into the machine at the front of the bus in exchange for those people to be able to get to where they need to go.
The MBTA can find a happy medium between giving people the option to use an automated fare system while not excluding people who need to pay in cash.
Yes, for younger people and people who do have credit cards, it’s more convenient to use a tap system. The transition to an automated fare system is inevitable for Boston, and it will make commutes much more efficient. But that doesn’t mean the MBTA needs to abandon the cash system entirely.
The MBTA could consider putting ticket machines at every above-ground train stop, allowing people to use any medium of payment. Revenue generated by trains running on time could help pay for this project.
Of the passengers who use the Green Line or ride the bus, 7 percent pay with cash, and on some bus lines, up to 20 percent of passengers pay with cash, as reported by The Boston Globe. Some of these people are homeless. Some are immigrants. For whatever reason, they may not have access to a bank account, or for their own safety, don’t want personal information connected to a credit card.
For many of us at Boston University, our parents helped us apply for debit or credit cards when we reached a certain age. They might have even connected our card to their bank account. But for people in low-income communities who haven’t had that privilege, the application process isn’t always so easy.
Credit card issuers take the income of applicants into account when they decide whether or not to approve applicants. They’re careful to approve people with the means to pay for their transactions. It can harm a person’s credit score by being declined from a credit card company, detering low-income people from even applying.
It will cost $750 million to upgrade the system, money that will likely be paid for by a fare increase — putting another burden on people who don’t have the capacity to take financial responsibility for the MBTA’s upkeep.
These public meetings are a chance for people to make the message heard that while timeliness matters, public transit is especially beneficial to the lower class. With this new system we might shave off several minutes on our ride, but at what cost to a community?
This transition might be inevitable, but right now the MBTA needs to find a way to address the concerns of Boston’s commuters without abandoning those who need the T the most. The MBTA should do the best it can to alleviate the transition and keep from placing undue financial barriers on what should be a public service.
