> [Al Putre] firmly defends the MetroCard system and its awkward swipe, on the grounds that it was far easier to maintain and thus cheaper than its alternatives: ”We got a lot out of that — the technology is 25 years old, and we’re still running it on an IBM mainframe.”
Why is swiping considered awkward? I lived in NYC for several years and never had much of problem with it. Every now and then you have to re-swipe, but not often enough for it to be a major inconvenience.
It's also one of those UI things that may not be perfect, but because people adapt to it, it doesn't need reworking. Like QWERTY, or Amazon.com. In fact a rework may even be counterproductive, and certainly expensive.
This is of course cut to only show failures. But, e.g., in Boston, the MBTA uses RFID cards. One big benefit is that I don't have to take the card out of my wallet: I only need to pull the wallet out of my pocket, and tap the entire thing against the sensor — it can read the card through the wallet.
I'd wager it's easier than that swipe. Probably lasts longer, as there isn't any physical contact.
(Now, the MBTA also still has a paper-card variant, and that isn't RFID: you have to feed the card through the machine. Tourists might encounter that, but the locals use RFID cards.)
Similarly, Caltrain in the Bay Area uses similar cards. (Not quite as nice, though, to reload…)
Right, I mean fundamentally from a system operators standpoint is about return on investment.
It's not like MTA decided to go with swipe at the same time that everyone else decided to go with contact list. MTA started using swipe cards in 1993 - contact-less cards didn't start reaching widespread use until the 2000s. The costs of switching systems twice in like 10-15 years would have been probably not the best.
In a lot of ways, MTA sticking with swipe (till now) is a lot like the story of NYC in the 20th century. Through NYC scale, it runs into a lot of situations first, and goes with some solution that ends up being totally what no one else decides on using when they reach NYC scale (either due to lessons learned from NYC, or just improvements in technology or knowledge).
Another benefit of RFID and modern readers is integration with phones. I think Portland, OR is one of the few cities in the US with good support for this.
- Your phone (or watch) can act as an RFID transit card, even when it’s out of battery. (Using apple’s transit card program)
- Any terminal can accept mobile wallets
Maybe as a permanent resident, the difference isn’t quite as big compared to typical RFID cards — just one less thing to carry. But when someone visits, it’s so convenient to not have to acquire a transit card and load it up, or buy tickets, or download an app, or acquire cash or coins. Most other cities (in the US), it’s a whole ordeal to figure out exactly how to pay for the transit system, where to buy the cards, it’s different everywhere, etc. But in Portland, all you need to know is that the terminals accept Apple Pay in any bus or train, and you’re good to go. It’s fantastic! I wish other cities would adopt these sorts of terminals. It makes public transit much more appealing especially as a visitor.
We have Apple Express Transit in Chicago too (Ventra) and it works great. The great part is one doesn’t need to unlock the phone — because of that its arguably more convenient than a transit card.
I used Apple Express Transit with New York City’s OMNY system last weekend and it was similarly amazing. I brought my Metrocard with me just in case but never had to use it.
LA metro rolled out the apple transit program for its TAP cards as well. the only weirdness about it is that transferring your card to the apple wallet renders your plastic chip card basically useless rather than remaining as a backup.
The SF Bay area got Apple Wallet support last week, too. I didn't want my physical card invalidated, so I created a new, virtual one from within Apple Wallet itself.
SF BART and other agencies using the Clipper system recently (within the last few weeks) rolled out mobile device support for iOS and Android. I was able to put my Clipper card into my iPhone by just tapping the phone on my card.
> I think Portland, OR is one of the few cities in the US with good support for this.
Agree with all of your following points but I just wanted to mention that every MTA subway station in NYC now supports digital wallet tap-to-pay as well as the buses.
Unlimitted monthly or weekly passes still need a magnetic-strip metrocard but I canceled my unlimited plan in April 2020 when I stopped commuting, I haven't gotten my Metrocard out of my wallet in several months now.
Melbourne, Australia, has Google Pay support for the transit system but not Apple Pay. I recently switched to iOS and the lack of phone transit support is the biggest pain so far (and I don't really even use public transport, living and working in the CBD/city/downtown, just walk through one of the stations quite often on the way to and from the office).
I have no idea what kind of costs were avoided, but what I can say is that I 10x prefer the UX of the Tube in London to the Metro in NYC. Contactless means I can use: a dedicated transit card, my credit card, my iPhone, or my Apple Watch to tap in.
I also much prefer the sliding gates rather than the turn-style, but that's a different consideration.
Also with regards to cost, I bet they would make a significant amount of the investment back with increased fare-paying if they did the sliding door style gate (that much harder to jump over) and the contactless entry (that much easier to pay for it).
They already installed contactless terminals in all stations
It's not going to improve payment, people who don't want to pay won't pay. The ROI on completely redoing turnstiles also probably wouldn't be great for the same reason. People hold the emergency door after all, and I don't see how a sliding gate can't just be kept open by shuffling in after someone else (the gate won't close with an obstruction right?)
I think you'd be surprised. Piracy went down when Netflix came along, because it made it easier to do "the right thing" (pay for your shit). I wouldn't underestimate the difference making it easier to pay for something has on revenue.
The gates in London do in fact close to prevent people from doing that. London doesn't have emergency doors like you have in NYC either, so that probably helps too.
Note that gate lines in London (and indeed elsewhere with the same system in the UK) will always have a staff member nearby to operate the gate line. If there isn't anybody available, the gate line is left open.
For example London Waterloo is an important enough station that for my last train home at 0105 from Waterloo, the last scheduled train from the station, the main gate line will still be running. There are likely a dozen or more employees still in the building, so why not.
But by the time it reaches the far smaller city where I live, its last stop for the night, about two hours later, the city is closed, nobody is attending the gate line, you could just walk out without a ticket.
The gates are however online, they just know there isn't anyone supervising so they don't close. Since I don't want to carry the paper ticket and dispose of it properly, I give it to the gate, which, despite being open, will conclude that this ticket isn't valid for any further journeys and swallow it. Attendants will take thousands of used tickets out and presumably they're recycled, or composted or burned, not my problem.
Also, in the event of an emergency you can force this style of gate, it will sound an alarm but an adult human is capable of exerting enough force to pass, which is what you should do if, somehow, you find yourself fleeing say, a fire, and the gate is closed but unattended.
I live in NY, that emergency door, alarm and all, will be propped open all day
Maybe if someone is watching people might be deterred but I've watched it stay open for 6 people straight with a cop standing 10 ft away, most of them don't care
I took that to mean that the manner of swiping required is awkward. If you are only used to credit card swiping its a very different feel- slightly slower and different friction. When I first moved it took me several swipes to the frustration of many experienced NYers behind me.
One big thing allowing NY to keep its legacy system is that you only swipe upon entry but not exit (since all fares are flat rate). Entry into a subway system is uniform but exit is lumpy so RFID systems have to be put into place to get enough people out through a limited set of gates without excessive waiting.
The upgrade to the NYC system is mainly so that it can introduce distance based pricing but nobody is willing to say this bit out loud.
It's awkward because people who are new to the city don't intuitively understand the necessary cadence of the swipe. Every time I bring a friend to the city for the first time and hand them a card, they struggle to get the machine to read their swipe. First, they swipe too slowly, I tell them to speed it up. They swipe again, too quickly this time, and I tell them to slow it down. They look at me, exasperated, and I take the card and swipe myself through to show them the rhythm. They usually mess it up one or two more times before they get it right.
Furthermore, I would argue that the cards are shaped incorrectly--the cut edge of the card is on the trailing edge of the swipe, which seems unintuitively for something meant to be pushed forwards.
Ha, I think you’ve just mastered it unconsciously. First time users tend to struggle with the timing of it (not too fast, not too slow) and don’t always realize it has worked or not. I’ve seen countless people walk into a turnstile that isn’t open as well as stand there with the card in their hand waiting for someone unaware that the beep (of which there are often many going on at once) signals they can pass, as well as the little click sound or in many cases the green light or the little LED lights that say “Paid”....
The swipe is so awkward they made a mini-game out of it in Among Us (not sure if this is true but the experience is the same, too fast, too slow, etc.)
RFID solutions are just vastly superior. Go to Tokyo and ride around the trains there. You can hover your card over the reader, tap your phone, your watch, whatever, and it reads it reliably 99.9% of the time (another made up fact but yeah, it's reliable).
Pretty much the entire rest of the world has long since moved to tap/RFID solutions, which are faster and less fiddly. In fact off the top of my head I can't think of any other major city still using swipe cards, even in developing countries.
It is worth noting that the same year the MetroCard became usable on the entire system (1997) Hong Kong launched its Octopus smartcard, which is just tap and go and works even if, say, your card is in a wallet inside a handbag.
WMATA in DC would introduce a smartcard in 1999, so New York mostly bought a technology at the tail end of its life and had to pay the increasing costs of maintaining it.
> [Al Putre] firmly defends the MetroCard system and its awkward swipe, on the grounds that it was far easier to maintain and thus cheaper than its alternatives: ”We got a lot out of that — the technology is 25 years old, and we’re still running it on an IBM mainframe.”