Gothamist
A non-profit newsroom, powered by WNYC.
Gothamist
Listen Live
News
MTA Announces No Fare Hikes This Year
By
Stephen Nessen
Published Jul 19, 2021
Share
FacebookTwitterRedditEmail
Never miss a story
Email address
By submitting your information, you're agreeing to receive communications from New York Public Radio in accordance with our Terms .
By
Stephen Nessen
Published Jul 19, 2021
Share
FacebookTwitterRedditEmail
We rely on your support to make local news available to all
Make your contribution now and help Gothamist thrive in 2026. Donate today
Gothamist is funded by sponsors and member donations
As ridership slowly returns to mass transit, MTA board members announced they will not push for a fare hike this year.
The MTA announced Monday that a previously postponed fare hike will not happen at all in 2021. MTA board member Larry Schwartz, who chairs the finance committee and is a close confidante and adviser to Governor Cuomo, said it would be inappropriate to raise fares, during Monday’s MTA committee meetings.
“Now is not the time to raise fares,” Schwartz said Monday. “At a time when we need to encourage increasing ridership, raising fares does the opposite.”
MTA spokesperson Tim Minton confirmed there would be no fare hikes this year in a Tweet shortly after Schwartz’s comments.
“Not having to pay more to ride transit in 2021 is good news that riders can use,” Lisa Daglian, who represents riders on the MTA board as the Executive Director of the Permanent Citizens Advisory Committee, wrote in a statement.
Schwartz said instead the MTA should find a “more equitable and fair structure” such as off peak and peak charges, and perhaps charge tourists more, although he didn’t elaborate on other ways to reduce MTA fares for New Yorkers.
Daglian added that she’d like to see the MTA expand the Freedom Ticket pilot, which she thinks “would encourage even more riders to get on board — critical as our region and economy continue to rebound and reopen.”
Following up on his boss's olive branch to the Democratic mayoral nominee Eric Adams, Schwartz called on forming a renewed relationship with the city to help work on funding the MTA.
“We should be working with mayor-elect Adams, the new council speaker, the new council board members, we should be working with our state legislative partners and looking at various ways to generate revenue to support this agency,” Schwartz said. (Adams is not the mayor-elect; he will face Republican Curtis Sliwa in the general election this November.)
Schwartz said the MTA board would have had to vote on a fare increase at the next board meeting in September if it was to go into effect by November. He said he’ll make a motion at Wednesday’s full board meeting to not raise fares. However, speaking to two reporters after the meeting, Schwartz did suggest that fares may be raised in 2022.
“The governor should stop any fare hikes until ridership has substantially returned,” Danny Pearstein with Riders Alliance wrote in a statement. “A fare hike this year would be highly inequitable, contribute to growing gridlock, and slow the city's reopening and recovery.”
Another program that was supposed to generate billions of dollars for the MTA, congestion pricing, is still in the “discussion” phase with federal officials, according to the agency, despite pressure from Mayor de Blasio last week to move things along faster.
Ridership across the MTA’s properties is returning, if a little unevenly. While the subways are seeing a stretch of more than 2.5 million riders a day, it’s still down 52 percent from pre-pandemic levels. Bus ridership is only down about 40 percent from before the pandemic. And in June, bridge and tunnel crossings were down only 3% compared to 2019 levels.
The MTA is capturing revenue from the return of drivers. While it held off on fare hikes, toll hikes went into effect in April.
Tagged
we the commuters
MTA
bus
fare hike
subway
commuter rail
Stephen Nessen
Stephen Nessen covers transportation. Since 2008 he has reported on everything from Occupy Wall Street, the rebuilding of the World Trade Center site, Hurricane Sandy, to Trump’s campaign for president. His transportation reporting has taken him everywhere from the MTA’s secret Rail Control Center to the gleaming subways of Seoul. Got a tip? Email [email protected].
Read more
Gothamist is funded by sponsors and member donations
Gothamist is funded by sponsors and member donations
MORE news
Central Park birders, others remember 63-year-old woman killed in park
People who said they knew her described her as an artist and a familiar presence in the Ramble.
By
Charles Lane
Published Sep 28, 2026 at 7:04 p.m. ET
Dump truck driver hits and kills cyclist on 34th Street in Midtown, NYPD says
It's the latest in a string of hit-and-run deaths in the city in recent months.
By
Liam Quigley
News
Dump truck driver hits and kills cyclist on 34th Street in Midtown, NYPD says
It's the latest in a string of hit-and-run deaths in the city in recent months.
By
Liam Quigley
New ingredient mandated for Latin American kitchen, restaurant plates in NJ
By
Arya Sundaram
A Brooklyn jail cell filled with smoke. The emergency button failed, a lawyer said.
By
Samantha Max
Crews launch tunnel machines to dig first new Hudson River rail tunnels since 1910
By
Michael Sol Warren
Never miss a story
Catch up on the most important headlines with a roundup of essential NYC stories, delivered to your inbox daily.
Sign upEmail address
By submitting your information, you're agreeing to receive communications from New York Public Radio in accordance with our Terms .