Higher Fares, Tolls Kick In

Toll and fare increases take effect across the Metropolitan Transportation Authority's system Thursday, but they won't solve the agency's deep fiscal problems.

The agency is aiming to up the revenue it receives from fares and tolls by 7.5%. To do that, it is implementing a set of increases that vary in magnitude. MTA officials said they tried to limit the increase for their lowest-income customers. So 30-day MetroCard users, who tend to be wealthier commuters with stable jobs, will get a fare increase that's almost 10 percentage points higher than the one going to those who use a pay-per-ride card.

That means that the 30-day pass won't be a good buy for some riders anymore. To make a 30-day pass more cost-effective than a pay-per-ride card, a straphanger now needs to use it at least 50 times a month. Under the old fare structure, the rider needed to swipe it 46 times.

The increases come at the end of a difficult year for the MTA. To fill an $800 million gap in its budget created by a shortfall in state taxes, the agency cut subway, bus and commuter rail service in June, laid off workers and embarked on a systemwide cost-cutting push.

The MTA is aiming to up the revenue it receives from fares and tolls by 7.5%.

Still, the size of the increase is in one sense a victory for MTA Chairman and Chief Executive Jay Walder, who trimmed $500 million from the agency's budget. It's the same increase his predecessor agreed to in 2009 as part of a plan to bail out the agency, months before the revenue shortfall appeared.

Even with the increase, the MTA's $11.3 billion 2011 budget sits on shaky ground. It expects to finish the year with just an $8 million surplus. That could easily disappear if state revenue falls off or the agency doesn't achieve the cost savings it expects. Its capital-spending plan, meanwhile, will run out of money at the end of 2011 if the MTA and the state government can't come up with a way to fund it.