PERMANENT CITIZENS ADVISORY COMMITTEE TO THE MTA
MINUTES OF DECEMBER 3, 2015
A meeting of the Permanent Citizens Advisory Committee (PCAC) to the MTA was convened at 12:00 noon on December 3, 2015, in the 16th Floor Conference at 2 Broadway, New York City.
The following members were present:
Andrew Albert
William K. Guild
Sheila Carpenter
Marisol Halpern
Mark Epstein
Trudy Mason
Randy Glucksman
Maureen Michaels
Stuart Goldstein
Scott Nicholls
Ira Greenberg
Edith Prentiss
Burton Strauss, Jr.
The following members were on the telephone:
Francena Amparo
Bryan Peranzo
Christopher Greif
Larry Rubinstein
The following members were absent:
Gerard Bringmann
Rhonda Herman
Richard Cataggio
Sharon King Hoge
Francis T. Corcoran
Matthew Kessler
Owen Costello
Raymond Pagano
Mike Godino
Michael Sinansky
Neal Zuckerman
In addition, the following persons were present:
William Henderson -PCAC Executive Director
Ellyn Shannon -PCAC Associate Director
Angela Bellisio -PCAC Transportation Planner
Bradley Brashears -PCAC Transportation Planner
Karyl Berger -PCAC Research Associate
Mark Young -LIRR
Delana Glenn -Metro-North
Brian Row -Metro-North
Jesse McKinney -NYCT
Deborah Hall-Moore -NYCT
Orrin Getz -NJ-ARP
Craig Lader -Westchester County-Bee Line
Yvonne Morrow -Concerned citizen
Barry Adler -Concerned citizen
John Tauranac -Concerned citizen
Wilhelm Ronda -Concerned citizen
Richard Schulman -Concerned citizen
Approval of Agenda and Minutes
The agenda for the December 3, 2015 meeting was approved. The minutes of the September 3, 2015 meeting were approved.
Chairs’ Reports
The PCAC, LIRRCC, MNRCC and NYCTRC Chairs’ Reports are attached to these minutes. Council Chair reports were distributed to members prior to the meeting and not presented in their entirety.
LIRRCC
Chair Mark Epstein invited any questions or comments on his report, of which there were none.
MNRCC
Chair Randolph Glucksman noted that he had failed to convince Metro-North not to cancel train 1601 or to provide alternate service for its riders. He said that Metro-North has claimed that they received no complaints, but noted that the complaints would likely have been made to NJ Transit, which operates West of Hudson Metro-North service.
NYCTRC
Andrew Albert said that NYC Transit is losing Joe Leader as its senior Vice President of Subways on December 11 and that Wynton Habersham will serve in the position in an acting capacity. He said that when Veronique Hakim assumes the NYC Transit Presidency, she may bring her own candidate to fill the Senior Vice President – Subways position.
Maureen Michaels stated that this is the first time she has heard about Freedom Ticket and that she objects to NYC Transit releasing its proposal for a pilot project.
Mark Epstein remarked that if the PCAC does not work together, then it should be broken apart and each Council should have separate staff.
Andrew Albert stated that the primary purpose of the proposal is to provide service to underserved areas within New York City.
Bill Henderson noted that support for Freedom Ticket is a longstanding position of the PCAC.
The Committee discussed the process that should be followed for the release of reports.
Stuart Goldstein said that in the future Councils issuing a report should involve any other Councils that are affected in a discussion before the report is released.
Trudy Mason commented that there should have been more notice given to members of the press conference where the Freedom Ticket report was released. She said she did not have enough time to adjust her schedule so that she could attend.
Marisol Halpern added that she believes the issue is communication among the Councils. She agreed that there should have been input from the LIRRCC and MNRCC on this report and that there was not enough opportunity to read and comment. She said that the idea of the Freedom Ticket has been floating around for years but there should have been more opportunity for review of the report by members.
Ellyn Shannon wanted to know how much time is needed for review of reports. Burt Strauss responded that in his opinion two weeks would be needed.
Ira Greenberg said that a draft of the report had been given to the PCAC Executive Committee and that there was some back and forth discussion on the recommendations in it, but that he did not know that the report was going to be released and the final draft was not circulated to the Executive Committee.
Chris Greif commented that with the Freedom Ticket report, Mr. Albert asked Ms. Shannon at the last NYCTRC meeting to discuss Freedom Ticket and for a period of about fifteen minutes she outlined the proposal that would be included in the report. He said that members had an opportunity to comment at that point.
Ms. Michaels stated there was a typographical error in the MNRCC Chair’s Report regarding the amount that Amtrak is billing Metro-North for the use of its tracks. Mr. Henderson said it would be corrected in the version maintained for the record.
Mr. Glucksman said that a procedure would be developed to deal explicitly with similar situations. Ms. Michaels stated that something else needs to be done so that a process like this does not happen again. Mr. Glucksman said that all should bear in mind that the objective of the PCAC is to improve service for riders.
Old Business
No old business was considered.
New Business
Copies of the proposed 2016 PCAC budget were distributed. Mr. Henderson said that although spending has not been as high as anticipated, he anticipates several large disbursements over the next month. He noted that the PCAC also receives funding for personnel from the MTA and that a major victory has been achieved in getting the MTA to agree to make the Transportation Planner position currently held by Bradley Brashears permanent.
The Budget was approved with Mr. Greenberg and Ms. Michaels voting no.
Introduction of Long Island Rail Road Vice President and Chief Financial Officer Mark Young, Metro-North Railroad Director – Operations Planning and Analysis Delana Glenn, and New York City Transit Chief Officer — Program Management Jesse McKinney to Discuss Plans for and Progress toward New Fare Collection Systems for MTA Operating Agencies.
Jesse McKinney discussed the open payment model that the MTA is pursuing for fare payment. He said that the goal is to have an integrated, reliable, and convenient system. One step toward that future involves the interface between credit and debit cards and fare collection equipment. The magnetic stripe and contact chip cards that are prevalent in the financial service industry are not well suited to rapid fare collection, so the MTA is trying to get banks to change to a dual interface smart card system with both contact and contactless features. There are also plans to add a wallet app for payment and a broader phone app.
Mr. McKinney said that the new fare system requires a back-end infrastructure that is not necessarily visible to riders but represents the bulk of the system. This includes sales channels, a website, mobile ticketing subsystems, an interactive voice response system and call center, and an integrated retail network. The plan is to sell cards for the system at existing retail merchants in the same way that gift cards for restaurants and retail stores are marketed. There would be no pre-encoding of the cards and they would have value only when activated at a sales counter.
An objective of designing the system is to provide a best in class digital experience using a “bring your own media” approach, which could include a rider’s credit or debit cards as well as a card purchased at a retail store.
Mr. Mc Kinney outlined the status of the project. The project team has completed the business requirements development process and has a Request for Proposals package ready to be issued. The team is working on industry outreach and has been a participant in the Transit Roundtable and hosted informational events with players in the payments industry. The Request for Proposals for a system supplier is currently on hold, pending approval of a MTA Capital Program, and the process will move forward as soon as Capital Program Review Board approval is received.
Richard Schulman asked the schedule for implementation of the new fare payment system. Mr. McKinney responded that development had taken three and one-half years and that it would take approximately three years to phase in the system. The system would first accept cards and devices meeting an open payment standard, and an MTA card would be a later payment alternative.
Orrin Getz asked whether the system would be integrated with other area transportation agencies. Mr. McKinney replied that if another system accepts open payments, it can be integrated. In the case of PATH, the MTA is working directly with them since they accept MetroCard for payment. As New Jersey Transit does not accept MetroCard, the MTA is not working directly with them.
Delana Glenn of Metro-North Railroad and Mark Young of the Long Island Rail Road presented the commuter railroads’ perspective on new fare payment. Mr. Young said that there are five sales channels that commuter rail riders can use to purchase fares and that over the last twenty years most of the ticket sales initiatives have been joint efforts. The ticket vending machines (TVMs) were procured jointly and there is at least one TVM in all but a few stations. Other sales channels include ticket agents, on-board purchases, mail and ride, and web ticket, which will only be active for a limited time longer on the LIRR and will be discontinued on Metro-North when mobile device ticketing is launched.
In 2003, the railroads launched a three-tiered fare system, with a base fare at stations, a higher fare for on-board purchases, and a discounted mail and ride fare. Within that fare structure there are a number of ticket types, such as weekly, peak and off-peak, and reduced fares, and these will generally remain in force. Richard
Schulman asked whether removing the discount from web ticket had reduced its popularity, and Ms. Glenn replied that web ticket sales were very low and not reduced appreciably by the loss of the discount. She added that the relationships between the costs of different fare types is similar between the two railroads.
Mr. Young said that in 2008, Metro North started automating on-board sales and that the two railroads have since worked together to develop better technology for these sales. The on-board equipment will be iPhone based and able to accept credit and debit cards and to scan driver licenses for issuing invoices where riders lack funds or payment cards.
Mr. Glucksman asked whether these units can be used to make calls, and Mr. Young said they could not at present. He said that at the LIRR these units will eventually replace the phones that have been issued to train crews.
Mr. Albert asked the success rate of collections from invoices. Ms. Glenn said that using the past manual system 55 percent of billed fares were collected, but this rate is improving with the new system. Final figures are not available since the new system has been operating only since March. Mr. Young said the success rate to date is 35 percent but that further payments are expected. Mr. Schulman asked why fare scofflaws are able to continue receiving invoices. Mr. Young responded that it is difficult to identify repeat offenders and crews need to keep trains moving.
Mr. Epstein asked whether Metro-North and LIRR tickets can be coordinated to allow a ticket bought through one railroad to be used on the other. Ms. Glenn replied that this is a tariff policy decision that will be made in moving to a new fare system.
Ms. Glenn said that on-board fare payment is now fully implemented with 720 conductors and that credit and debit cards account for 30 percent of purchases. The number of invoices issued to riders without funds has decreased slightly due to payment cards being accepted and that conductors receive service alerts on the fare sales equipment. Edith Prentiss asked why there is still a penalty fare for on-board purchases in view of the ease of selling on board. Ms. Glenn commented that there is a balance between the additional cost and the staffing needed, as well as the need to reducing congestion in the aisles.
Mr. Greif asked if the presentation could be made available and noted that ticket vending machines break and some persons find using them difficult. Sheila Carpenter noted that persons eligible for reduced fare can purchase on-board without penalty.
Mr. Young said that LIRR has not fully deployed on-board services. The LIRR has tested devices, but Metro-North has labor contracts that allowed them to deploy the technology more quickly. Discussions with LIRR labor organizations are underway to reach the agreements that allow a broad rollout, and five conductors are testing the devices. Although there has been a push to roll out the devices, the delay at the LIRR will allow the rollout to proceed with the iPhone 6.
In terms of mobile ticketing, Mr. Young said that they are working on an application in cooperation with Masabi, and that users would download the application. The railroads will wrap up product development with Masabi by the end of the year and Metro-North will launch a pilot with a limited number of customers in the first quarter of 2016, then expand as the successful rollout proceeds. Once the LIRR gets the authorization to proceed, they once thought that it would take a year to get devices to crew members, but now believe that the rollout can approach the Metro-North schedule.
Ms. Glenn noted that the New Jersey Transit and West of Hudson process for rolling out a ticketing application was easier because it relies on visual inspection. The MTA railroads will be the first to use electronic inspection, where the device reads and cancel the electronic ticket. Mr. Young commented that the electronic ticket on New Jersey Transit is valid for a period one and one-half times the length of the trip once it is activated, which prevents reuse of the ticket.
Mr. Greenberg said that he assumed the process will generate valuable travel data. Mr. Epstein agreed that this process could generate a great deal of data.
Ms. Carpenter said that, on a trip to Great Britain, a train she had planned to take was cancelled, but she bought the ticket through a third party and could not get a refund. She asked whether this system will allow for refunds and whether a $10 refund fee will apply. Ms. Glenn responded that refunds are available but that the fee is a tariff policy issue. She noted that if the policy differs between mobile and paper tickets it could be seen as an equity issue.
Mr. Young reviewed the process of moving to the new fare payment system. He said that the documentation of current conditions is complete as is the peer review of the system and the long term strategy for fare collection, which has been recommended to the operating agency Presidents. The next step is an implementation and migration plan that will outline the move to the new system. Up to this point, the system has been funded from operating budget, but it will soon require capital funding. This funding is provided in the next two Capital Programs.
Mr. Greenberg asked if the system will help in ensuring that tickets are collected.
Mr. Young said that the system would allow them to match ticket collections to particular trips, which allows them to see where tickets are not being collected.
Mr. Glucksman commented that in the Oyster system used by Transport for London riders can use credit cards. William Guild asked whether the new Chicago fare system is in place. Mr. McKinney responded that Chicago has deployed an open payment system and that it is operating.
Mr. Epstein asked whether smartphones could be used for both NYC Transit and commuter rail. Mr. McKinney replied that most new phones now are Near Field Communications-enabled, but other phones could display a commuter rail ticket.
Mr. Albert said that he assumes that implementation will stretch to the next Capital Program. Mr. Young replied that ticket vending machine replacement is scheduled for the 2020-2024 Capital Program, but this schedule could be accelerated.
Adjournment
The meeting was adjourned at 2:00 pm.
Respectfully submitted,
William Henderson
Executive Director