(Newhouse News Service circulated the following article by Joe Malinconico on November 1.)
JERSEY CITY, N.J. — Facing complaints from commuters, NJ Transit has put on hold its plans to revise the fee it charges riders who want to upgrade their tickets to extend their trips to New York.
The change would have tripled the surcharge for many passengers on the Morris and Essex and Montclair-Boonton lines.
“That takes a load off my mind,” said Beth Shallin, who commutes from Montclair’s Walnut Street station to Lower Manhattan, when told NJ Transit was holding off on the new policy.
Normally, Shallin uses her monthly pass to take the Montclair-Boonton line to Hoboken Terminal and switches to the PATH train to the World Trade Center station. But some days, for various reasons, she takes Midtown Direct trains to New York Penn Station and then the subway downtown.
Right now, Shallin pays an extra 85 cents to upgrade her ticket. Under the new policy, which was going to take effect yesterday, she would have been charged $2.75 for the “change-in-terminal” fee.
Commuters on NJ Transit’s Northeast Corridor and North Jersey Coast lines generally pay $2.75 to extend their trips from Newark Penn Station to Manhattan. That $2.75 is basically the difference in one-way ticket prices for those destinations.
But on the Morris and Essex and Montclair-Boonton lines, the difference in a one-way ticket between going to Hoboken Terminal or to Manhattan on a one-way ticket tends to cost less than a dollar.
The change is already listed on the new rail schedules that went into effect this weekend, but transit crews are going to continue charging customers the old prices, Hackett said.