Why is swiping considered awkward? I lived in NYC for several years and never had much of problem with it. Every now and then you have to re-swipe, but not often enough for it to be a major inconvenience.
It's also one of those UI things that may not be perfect, but because people adapt to it, it doesn't need reworking. Like QWERTY, or Amazon.com. In fact a rework may even be counterproductive, and certainly expensive.
This is of course cut to only show failures. But, e.g., in Boston, the MBTA uses RFID cards. One big benefit is that I don't have to take the card out of my wallet: I only need to pull the wallet out of my pocket, and tap the entire thing against the sensor — it can read the card through the wallet.
I'd wager it's easier than that swipe. Probably lasts longer, as there isn't any physical contact.
(Now, the MBTA also still has a paper-card variant, and that isn't RFID: you have to feed the card through the machine. Tourists might encounter that, but the locals use RFID cards.)
Similarly, Caltrain in the Bay Area uses similar cards. (Not quite as nice, though, to reload…)
- Your phone (or watch) can act as an RFID transit card, even when it’s out of battery. (Using apple’s transit card program)
- Any terminal can accept mobile wallets
Maybe as a permanent resident, the difference isn’t quite as big compared to typical RFID cards — just one less thing to carry. But when someone visits, it’s so convenient to not have to acquire a transit card and load it up, or buy tickets, or download an app, or acquire cash or coins. Most other cities (in the US), it’s a whole ordeal to figure out exactly how to pay for the transit system, where to buy the cards, it’s different everywhere, etc. But in Portland, all you need to know is that the terminals accept Apple Pay in any bus or train, and you’re good to go. It’s fantastic! I wish other cities would adopt these sorts of terminals. It makes public transit much more appealing especially as a visitor.
Agree with all of your following points but I just wanted to mention that every MTA subway station in NYC now supports digital wallet tap-to-pay as well as the buses.
Unlimitted monthly or weekly passes still need a magnetic-strip metrocard but I canceled my unlimited plan in April 2020 when I stopped commuting, I haven't gotten my Metrocard out of my wallet in several months now.
I used Apple Express Transit with New York City’s OMNY system last weekend and it was similarly amazing. I brought my Metrocard with me just in case but never had to use it.
It's not like MTA decided to go with swipe at the same time that everyone else decided to go with contact list. MTA started using swipe cards in 1993 - contact-less cards didn't start reaching widespread use until the 2000s. The costs of switching systems twice in like 10-15 years would have been probably not the best.
In a lot of ways, MTA sticking with swipe (till now) is a lot like the story of NYC in the 20th century. Through NYC scale, it runs into a lot of situations first, and goes with some solution that ends up being totally what no one else decides on using when they reach NYC scale (either due to lessons learned from NYC, or just improvements in technology or knowledge).
I also much prefer the sliding gates rather than the turn-style, but that's a different consideration.
Also with regards to cost, I bet they would make a significant amount of the investment back with increased fare-paying if they did the sliding door style gate (that much harder to jump over) and the contactless entry (that much easier to pay for it).
It's not going to improve payment, people who don't want to pay won't pay. The ROI on completely redoing turnstiles also probably wouldn't be great for the same reason. People hold the emergency door after all, and I don't see how a sliding gate can't just be kept open by shuffling in after someone else (the gate won't close with an obstruction right?)
The gates in London do in fact close to prevent people from doing that. London doesn't have emergency doors like you have in NYC either, so that probably helps too.
For example London Waterloo is an important enough station that for my last train home at 0105 from Waterloo, the last scheduled train from the station, the main gate line will still be running. There are likely a dozen or more employees still in the building, so why not.
But by the time it reaches the far smaller city where I live, its last stop for the night, about two hours later, the city is closed, nobody is attending the gate line, you could just walk out without a ticket.
The gates are however online, they just know there isn't anyone supervising so they don't close. Since I don't want to carry the paper ticket and dispose of it properly, I give it to the gate, which, despite being open, will conclude that this ticket isn't valid for any further journeys and swallow it. Attendants will take thousands of used tickets out and presumably they're recycled, or composted or burned, not my problem.
Also, in the event of an emergency you can force this style of gate, it will sound an alarm but an adult human is capable of exerting enough force to pass, which is what you should do if, somehow, you find yourself fleeing say, a fire, and the gate is closed but unattended.
The NYC subway system's answer to that: full-height turnstiles.[1]
NYC can do that because their system predates the ADA and they don't have to offer wheelchair access.
[1] https://turnstileinstallation.us/wp-content/uploads/2019/12/...
Maybe if someone is watching people might be deterred but I've watched it stay open for 6 people straight with a cop standing 10 ft away, most of them don't care
The upgrade to the NYC system is mainly so that it can introduce distance based pricing but nobody is willing to say this bit out loud.
Furthermore, I would argue that the cards are shaped incorrectly--the cut edge of the card is on the trailing edge of the swipe, which seems unintuitively for something meant to be pushed forwards.
RFID solutions are just vastly superior. Go to Tokyo and ride around the trains there. You can hover your card over the reader, tap your phone, your watch, whatever, and it reads it reliably 99.9% of the time (another made up fact but yeah, it's reliable).