Albuquerque Journal

ABQ Ride Cuts Price of Transfers
By Lloyd Jojola, Journal Staff Writer

The news is a bit better for users of the city bus system.
   
While ABQ Ride still plans on charging its passengers to use a bus transfer, the agency has backed away from the original idea of charging 50 cents and will charge 25 cents instead.
   
The start of the new policy also has been pushed back a few weeks to Sept. 2.
   
Citing the need to stem fraud, waste and abuse tied to the transfer system, last week officials announced that the new policy would go into effect.
   
"We need to address the issue, but we could do it in a manner that doesn't unduly impact all the good passengers we have out there," Transit Director Greg Payne said Tuesday about the decision to reduce the charge.
   
Word's been out about the plan, and some passengers were bracing for a hit.
   
"The way things are right now, it's pretty hard for people like us to pay 50 cents" extra, Leopold Salinas, a 64-year-old disabled landscaper, said recently while waiting for the Lomas bus at the Alvarado Transportation Center. He uses a transfer once, sometimes twice, when riding the bus, he said. "It will affect me very much."
   
Amalia Monk, a 48-year-old hospitality industry worker, said, "It's kind of hard for people like me who are barely making it, but it's better than paying a whole dollar. ... Sometimes I have enough trouble scrounging up a dollar as it is. Right now, I'm unemployed and looking for work."
   
Transit Department officials maintain the policy change isn't a revenue grab, but about stemming abuse of the transfer system — such as people using transfer slips repeatedly, handling them off to others or selling them — and pushing more people to use bus passes.
   
ABQ Ride's base fare will remain $1 for adults, 35 cents for seniors and students. Passengers will still be given a bus transfer slip when requested, but to use the transfer to connect to another bus, they will have to pay 25 cents to use it.
   
ABQ Ride plans to install self-serve kiosks at several locations to allow riders to buy passes anytime. The first will be put at the new Northwest Transit Center, near Coors Bypass and Ellison. The center is set to open Sept. 2.