This week, Greater Dayton RTA proposed that they were going to start selling daily passes next year. I thought I would look into what transit services offer daily passes. This led to the chart below.
*As a disclaimer, I wouldn’t put too much into the actual prices of fares. I would say that comparing smaller transit services with the larger agencies will lead to noticeable price differences. In the larger agencies, the rider is getting more service for his or her money, which is often more than a smaller transit service. Also, COTA and SORTA have varying pricing structures (in Cincinnati they are called zones). To make the chart easier, I only included the fares for the smallest region. (Local in COTA and Cincinnati for SORTA). Clicking on the agency name will take you to the fare price structure page.
Unless you are planning on traveling all day, making three or four stops, several hours apart, buying two single fares should be cheaper than buying a daily pass. This only makes sense as a business. A few transit agencies (Akron Metro and SARTA) make it easy on the rider by simply pricing the day pass as twice a single fare. It gets a little bit more complicated if the transit agency charges a fee for transferring. Currently, this might be a benefit for buying a one-day pass with GDRTA, who charges a nominal .25 fee for transfers. Buying an All-Day pass would avoid having to deal with planning transfers.
A third factor that would be useful in determining a price for All-day passes , which I won’t go into much, is the hours of operation of the agency. If buses only run from 7 am to 6 pm, there is much less opportunity to use more than 2 rides.
Overall, if logistically possible, the one-day pass is a good idea. For outsiders (travelers and locals who typically don’t use transit), a one-day pass is very welcoming in setting a one-time fee. Depending on the economics of pricing a pass, it may not be used by frequent riders, but it is nice to have.
|
Fare |
Transfer |
Daily |
Monthly/31 |
Senior |
Akron Metro |
$1.25 |
|
$2.50 |
$50.00 |
$0.50 |
Allen RTA |
$1.00 |
Free |
|
$34.00 |
$0.50 |
COTA |
$1.75 |
2 hours |
$4.00 |
$55.00 |
|
GCRTA |
$2.25 |
2 hours |
$5.00 |
$85.00 |
$1.00 |
GDRTA |
$1.75 |
$0.25 |
$5.00 (coming soon) |
$55.00 |
$0.85 |
Laketran |
$1.75 |
Free |
No |
No |
$0.75 |
LCT |
$2.35 |
Free |
$5.00 |
$94.00 |
$1.15 |
RCT |
$1.50 |
Free |
|
$40.00 |
$0.75 |
SARTA |
$1.50 |
|
$3.00 |
$45.00 |
$0.75 |
SCAT |
$0.75 |
$0.25 |
|
$55.00 |
|
SORTA |
$1.75 |
$0.50 |
No |
$70.00 |
$0.85 |
TARTA |
$1.00 |
none |
|
$40.00 |
$0.50 |
WRTA |
$1.25 |
$0.25 |
No |
$42.00 |
$0.60 |