Because New York City Transit needs a few months’ lead time in order to prepare MetroCard Vending Machines for half-priced student passes, the MTA Board will vote on the future of free student travel during its June 23 meeting, The Post reported on Saturday. “After you hit July, it would make things really difficult,” Hilary Ring, the MTA’s director of governmental affairs, said to lawmakers last week. “It’s not like you can just flip a switch or something; it’s more complicated than that.”
According to a report in The Wall Street Journal, MTA officials are engaged with state representatives on potential student travel funding plans, but time is, of course, of the essence. We need the state to understand that we can’t continue to function as a free bus service,” Ring said. In related news, New York City announced recently that it will end courtesy busing for 5000 students who currently attend schools hard to reach via transit. While the MTA will see revenues improve when students must pay, the city’s less wealthy families will suffer.
Meanwhile, lawmakers have been notably silent, at least in public, on the topic of potential rescue plans. In March, Pedro Espada, the state senate majority leader, proposed a modest bridge toll with revenues earmarked for student travel, and new council transportation committee chair James Vacca has vaguely pledged to do “everything we can” to rescue the student MetroCards. For now, though, it appears that until the economy improves, students will be saddled with footing their own bill for travel come the fall.
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