12-24-2023, 08:05 PM
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No, we're not. Multiple agency support aside, there's no technological reason we can't have a system that accepts credit and debit and an app that on phones with NFS can either update your card directly or be a virtual card, or use Google Pay, Apple Pay, etc… S&B supplies those capabilities to other systems, and the Region of Waterloo just has to want to pay for it. S&B does the development, everybody else that uses it has already subsidized it, so we wouldn't be on our own. feature parity is possible.
Indeed, back in October at a council meeting is was said that the Region hopes to have and app and credit & debit tap fare payment by fall 2024.
IMNSHO, PRESTO needs to be reorganized from a system vendor into a standards setter and transaction clearing house.
A standards setter in just that it lays out the data structures on cards and how fareboxes and kiosks and agency apps access things, and what the hardware and software needs to comply with to be compatible. They can certify existing third-party system vendors as pre-approved as well as certify new vendors that a municipality wants to use in the future.
A transaction clearing house for fares. When you pay with stored value from one agency for a ride with a different agency, the different agency reports it to PRESTO who then pays them, and PRESTO then collects from the original agency. Also, if somebody buys $25 stored value for GRT through the PRESTO app, PRESTO would pay that to GRT.
And then legislate that all Ontario transit agencies must use PRESTO as soon as their hardware has been certified.
I can think of a lot more complicated scenarios, like if the TTC and GRT wanted to honour each other's monthly passes, but then I think there would need to be some subsidization by PRESTO on behalf of the provincial government given the wildly varying monthly pass costs and how many trips a month you'd need to make before it becomes worth it. So maybe the TTC reports to PRESTO a ride with a GRT monthly pass and PRESTO gives the TTC $3 but only collects $2 from GRT?
(12-24-2023, 06:53 PM)taylortbb Wrote: This is the key point I think. Waterloo Region isn't big enough to justify the overhead costs of running our own modern smartcard fare system, so we're effectively stuck on a technological dead end.
No, we're not. Multiple agency support aside, there's no technological reason we can't have a system that accepts credit and debit and an app that on phones with NFS can either update your card directly or be a virtual card, or use Google Pay, Apple Pay, etc… S&B supplies those capabilities to other systems, and the Region of Waterloo just has to want to pay for it. S&B does the development, everybody else that uses it has already subsidized it, so we wouldn't be on our own. feature parity is possible.
Indeed, back in October at a council meeting is was said that the Region hopes to have and app and credit & debit tap fare payment by fall 2024.
(12-24-2023, 06:53 PM)taylortbb Wrote: We're not big enough to reasonably pay for developing an open payment system, but Metrolinx is. We can either move to Presto, or we can have a basic farecard system that never achieves feature parity with Presto/Oyster/OMNY/etc, the transit fare systems of major cities.
IMNSHO, PRESTO needs to be reorganized from a system vendor into a standards setter and transaction clearing house.
A standards setter in just that it lays out the data structures on cards and how fareboxes and kiosks and agency apps access things, and what the hardware and software needs to comply with to be compatible. They can certify existing third-party system vendors as pre-approved as well as certify new vendors that a municipality wants to use in the future.
A transaction clearing house for fares. When you pay with stored value from one agency for a ride with a different agency, the different agency reports it to PRESTO who then pays them, and PRESTO then collects from the original agency. Also, if somebody buys $25 stored value for GRT through the PRESTO app, PRESTO would pay that to GRT.
And then legislate that all Ontario transit agencies must use PRESTO as soon as their hardware has been certified.
I can think of a lot more complicated scenarios, like if the TTC and GRT wanted to honour each other's monthly passes, but then I think there would need to be some subsidization by PRESTO on behalf of the provincial government given the wildly varying monthly pass costs and how many trips a month you'd need to make before it becomes worth it. So maybe the TTC reports to PRESTO a ride with a GRT monthly pass and PRESTO gives the TTC $3 but only collects $2 from GRT?