MTA to stop issuing MetroCard in New York

[bicbasher]

New York's MTA will stop issuing MetroCards in New York from the end of the year. They were introduced in 1994 as a magnetic stripe smartcard for travel on MTA services and various partners including PATH.

Like London, MTA have introduced a contactless system called OMNY where passengers can use credit/debit cards, smartphones or a physical OMNY card to pay for travel.

OMNY in it's various forms now counts for the majority of use among passengers with MetroCard decreasing. As the MTA also have concessionary fares, those users are being sent OMNY cards to replace their MetroCards to continue receiving discounted fares.

MetroCards will still be valid in 2026 for existing customers, but no date has been confirmed for them to be converted to OMNY.

 

[stadler]

Is there going to be any effort to integrate tickets between the multiple modes of transport with OMNY being introduced. I have always found NYC to be so disjointed and disconnected between multiple modes. It is rather poor when you compare it to London where everything is linked up with the same Oyster and Contactless and Travelcard system.

NYC and the surrounding area is served by:

• MTA Subway
• MTA Buses
• MTA Staten Island Rail Road
• MTA Metro North Rail Road
• MTA Long Island Rail Road
• PATH Train
• New Jersey Transit Train
• Bee Line Bus
• NICE Bus

But yet hardly any of them accept each others tickets or are part of the same fare payment system. OMNY and Metrocards are accepted on the MTA Subway and MTA Buses and SIR as the main method of payment. But yet on the MNR and LIRR they do not accept OMNY or Metrocards despite being run by the same exact company. Both the MNR and LIRR operate as suburban services within NYC but yet they have a completely different fare system. You would think they could at least integrate MNR and LIRR for journeys within the NYC borders. It is so poor.

Then you have the PATH train which is just subway lines in NYC that are run by a separate company. But they have their own payment system with OMNY and Metrocard not accepted. Similarly for the New Jersey Transit that has another completely separate ticketing system.

Then you have the Bee Line buses and NICE buses which run services to and from NYC to areas just outside and are only partially integrated. Bee Line accepts Metrocards and i believe is accepting OMNY soon. But yet with NICE they only accept Metrocards with no OMNY acceptance and no published plans to start accepting it.

For such a major city it seems so poor that they struggle to integrate the ticketing. Why can they not have one system for all modes. I was hoping that with OMNY it would finally all get properly integrated but it seems not.

 

[rick9525]

Is there going to be any effort to integrate tickets between the multiple modes of transport with OMNY being introduced. I have always found NYC to be so disjointed and disconnected between multiple modes. It is rather poor when you compare it to London where everything is linked up with the same Oyster and Contactless and Travelcard system.

NYC and the surrounding area is served by:

• MTA Subway
• MTA Buses
• MTA Staten Island Rail Road
• MTA Metro North Rail Road
• MTA Long Island Rail Road
• PATH Train
• New Jersey Transit Train
• Bee Line Bus
• NICE Bus

But yet hardly any of them accept each others tickets or are part of the same fare payment system. OMNY and Metrocards are accepted on the MTA Subway and MTA Buses and SIR as the main method of payment. But yet on the MNR and LIRR they do not accept OMNY or Metrocards despite being run by the same exact company. Both the MNR and LIRR operate as suburban services within NYC but yet they have a completely different fare system. You would think they could at least integrate MNR and LIRR for journeys within the NYC borders. It is so poor.

Then you have the PATH train which is just subway lines in NYC that are run by a separate company. But they have their own payment system with OMNY and Metrocard not accepted. Similarly for the New Jersey Transit that has another completely separate ticketing system.

Then you have the Bee Line buses and NICE buses which run services to and from NYC to areas just outside and are only partially integrated. Bee Line accepts Metrocards and i believe is accepting OMNY soon. But yet with NICE they only accept Metrocards with no OMNY acceptance and no published plans to start accepting it.

For such a major city it seems so poor that they struggle to integrate the ticketing. Why can they not have one system for all modes. I was hoping that with OMNY it would finally all get properly integrated but it seems not.

OMNY works very well so the more providers that accept it the better. PATH does accept pay as you ride Metrocards but not Unlimited Metrocards or contactless. I doubt NJ Transit will accept anytime soon due to the costs involved for a limited number of routes serving NYC. Hopefully more of the NY commuter rail services that serves NYC will be integrated going forward.

 

[Bald Rick]

PATH accepts contactless now, as does all the subway.