(The following article by Joe Malinconico was posted on the Newark Star-Ledger website on November 22.)
NEWARK, N.J. — It’s out with the slow and in with the new.
That’s NJ Transit’s goal for the ticket machines at its rail stations and bus terminals.
The agency yesterday decided to spend $12.2 million to buy 157 machines and $5 million to upgrade the 543 machines that are now in operation.
The existing machines are notorious for their slow printing and require travelers to look up code numbers for stations. Often, travelers wait in line to undergo the ticket torture.
Officials promise the new dispensers will have faster printers and processors. The larger, ATM-style machines also will allow customers to pick their stations by touching icons on the screen.
For credit card customers, the system will store their five most recent trips, allowing users to repeat a previous transaction in a fraction of the time needed now.
“The new generation of NJ Transit ticket vending machines will make purchasing tickets more convenient and more efficient for our customers,” said NJ Transit Executive Director George Warrington.
The first 100 new machines should be in operation within a year and the systemwide overhaul is supposed to be done within five years. NJ Transit had planned to start the overhaul in 2004. But its contractor, Ascom Transport Systems, was going through a change in ownership that stalled the project, officials said.
The new machines also will have technology that could handle the proposed regional fare card that would allow mass transit users to use one ticket on NJ Transit, the PATH trains and New York City subways, Warrington said.
Ted Goldberg, a commuter on the Northeast Corridor line, said he usually buys his monthly passes through the vendors at the ticket windows because he uses the TransitChek program.
“But when I have used the machines, I found them to be a bit difficult and the credit card process only works about two-thirds of the time,” Goldberg said. “All in all, I would say a new machine would save me about 3 minutes once in a while.”
In other business, NJ Transit approved the $24.5 million purchase of 53 new cruiser buses, the model used for long-haul commuting routes, as well as a $1.9 million two-year lease on another 20 cruiser buses.
NJ Transit already has 289 new cruiser buses on order as the agency tries to meet the rising demand for bus service.
This marks the first time NJ Transit has leased buses in a short-term deal. Officials said the 20 leased buses, which will start service in January, will help the agency handle the workload until the new buses start arriving.