Fare evasion cost MTA $690 million in 2022 says report that suggests replacing turnstiles with new technology

Fare evasion cost the MTA $690 million last year, according to a new agency study that recommends upping enforcement, expanding low-income fare subsidies, and replacing the subway system’s turnstiles with more modern fare control devices.

“Fare and toll evasion ... have reached crisis levels, costing hundreds of millions of dollars in lost revenue, threatening the entire public transit system and tearing at the social fabric of the city and the region,” said the study by a panel of 16 “distinguished New Yorkers,” chosen last year by the MTA.

The figure outpaces last year’s estimated $500 million loss to fare-skipping. The $690 million lost to the system in 2022 is more than 10 times the $65 million the MTA allocated to boost off-peak service on a dozen subway lines citywide.

Bus, train and subway fares as well as vehicle tolls are a significant portion of the MTA’s budget — expected to bring in some $7 billion to the transit system this year, roughly 37% of the total cost of MTA operations.

The biggest monetary loss to fare evasion comes from buses, where a third of riders failed to pay the fare, costing the MTA an estimated $315 million.

On the subways, riders failed to pay an average of 400,000 times a day, costing $285 million last year, and commuter rail fare evasion came to about $44 million.

Drivers with obscured or counterfeit licenses plates account for $46 million in lost revenue from the MTA’s bridges and tunnels, the report says.

That figure does not include some $29.5 million in unpaid by-mail tolls for drivers without E-ZPass.

On subways, half of all fare evaders sneak in through the emergency exit gates. The other half jump or duck the turnstiles, or follow closely behind another rider on their swipe.

To fix the problem, the panel recommends the MTA replace turnstiles with a plexiglass door system.

“Modernizing fare arrays — turnstiles, exit gates and other physical barriers — is the single most important thing the MTA can do to reduce fare evasion in the subway,” the panel wrote.

Properly built, the doors will be tall enough to thwart turnstile jumpers and duckers, but wide enough to allow those in wheelchairs or with strollers to get through.

“Provided that the fire code authorities approve of the actual future design, this type of fare array should allow for the complete abolition of the emergency exit gates,” the report says.

On buses, the panel called for more of the MTA’s ”Eagle” teams of unarmed fare enforcers, and a redoubled effort to sign up New Yorkers for fare discount programs.

Noting that fare evasion spikes around school dismissal, the panel also recommended for a simplified student OMNY card to replace the various student MetroCard options.

The report calls for increased enforcement, but in a way that reserves criminal charges for serial fare-skippers or those who enable others to skip the fare — such as vandalizing MetroCard or OMNY machines, selling swipes or holding open exit gates.

“Criminal prosecution generally should be reserved for situations that go beyond random individual acts of evasion,” the panelists said.

The MTA should institute policies to “create customers, not criminals,” the authors wrote, calling fare evasion “a problem so big that enforcement alone cannot solve it.”

“What really rose to the top was not criminalizing poverty,” Lisa Daglian, panelist and executive director of the Permanent Citizens Advisory Council to the MTA, told the Daily News.

“Fare evasion is a bigger issue than any of us thought it would be — and so the solution has to be bigger,” she said.

The panel recommends a change in enforcement — an official warning to first-time offenders who are not wanted for or involved in another crime.

On a second offense, the report recommends a $100 summons — $50 of which would be given back to a fare evader in the form of an OMNY card.

“This approach has been taken in the Netherlands, and supports the effort to turn a fare evader into a paying customer,” the report says.

Three-time offenders would get no OMNY card, and would be hit with a $150 fine. Fourth time offenders would face a $200 fine, and serial recidivists would face criminal charges.

The panel also voiced strong support for an expansion of the city’s Fair Fares program to include New Yorkers making twice the federal poverty line or less.

“For every rider who participates in Fair Fares rather than fare evasion, the MTA would receive revenue that is crucially needed to keep the system alive and well for riders of all income levels,” the report reads.

The Fair Fare expansion is currently being debated as part of budget negotiations between Mayor Adams and the City Council.