"Using smart card technology, we will connect this region into a transportation system without boundaries using a single fare card," said King County Executive Ron Sims, who also chairs the Sound Transit Board of Directors. "This is a major step forward for users of mass transit, and marks a new level of cooperation between jurisdictions to creatively work on transportation issues affecting millions of people in our region."

By 2006, passengers will be able to easily transfer from one system to another without digging in their pockets for extra fares and tickets. It will just take a wave of a "smart card" embedded with a microchip that automatically calculates any fare due. The cards can be reloaded and used indefinitely, and will eliminate the current system of more than 300 types of tickets, passes and tokens.

The agreement signed today also confirms the selection of ERG Transit Systems [external link] as the vendor of the system. The company, based in Australia, has implemented automated fare collection projects in more than 200 cities throughout the world.

The new fare-collection system will feature a fare card containing a microchip. The chip can be loaded with a cash value or any amount equal to a pass sold by the partner agencies. The cards are read at the farebox, terminal or station with the fare automatically deducted.

In addition to making travel easier for passengers, the smart-card system will improve financial accounting for each of the partner agencies. Currently, the collection and redistribution of fares from passengers transferring between systems is cumbersome and can only be balanced and corrected annually. The new technology allows for daily reconciliation of regional revenues, which presently total about $97 million annually.

"We are excited to offer ferry customers this type of convenience, while bringing our revenue collection system into the 21^st Century," said Mike Thorne, WSF Director/CEO.

Project costs through 2016 are estimated at $80 million, and include: development; installation; shared administrative costs; individual agency implementation costs; and the first 10 years of operation. The new system should result in efficiencies that reduce operating costs.

Sims said the collaboration, known as the Central Puget Sound Regional Fare Coordination Project, represents an unprecedented degree of regional cooperation, commitment of resources, funding, policy coordination and cost sharing. He said the Federal Transit Administration [external link] considers the project to be the most collaborative initiative of its kind in the United States, and sees it as a governance model.

The new system will be expandable in more ways than one. Any public transit organization in Washington, Oregon and Idaho can join in the future. It also provides a system that can be used to pay for road tolls, parking fees, or other services.

It will also give businesses, such as Boeing and Microsoft, which subsidize public transit for their employees, better information about their employees’ ridership.