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The-Dominion-Post
Snapper was added to Wellington buses in 2008, but trains still require paper tickets.
Wellington paper train tickets will soon be a thing of the past.
At a meeting on Thursday, Greater Wellington Regional Councilors approved a plan to roll out Snapper cards to the railroad in the next six months.
Metlink CEO Scott Gallacher said his team aimed to begin testing the Snapper card on rail services within the first quarter of 2021.
Since their launch in 2008, Snapper cards have been used for the vast majority of bus trips in the capital.
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A nationwide ticketing system is scheduled to be implemented in 2022, on all New Zealand buses and trains.
The new national card was planned to be launched first on Wellington trains and eventually rolled out across the country by 2026.
Gallacher said that adding Snapper’s capabilities would allow Metlink to test the systems before the national ticket launch, although most of the technology would have to be replaced.
Councilwoman Rosamond Connelly urged Metlink to act quickly and “don’t let the perfect be the enemy of the good.”
“We’ve been waiting a long time and what we have still sucks,” he said.
The-Dominion-Post
Snapper cards account for more than 80 percent of fares on Metlink buses.
Roger Blakeley, who has the council’s transportation portfolio, said it was a long-awaited change.
“It has been a source of frustration that we are still using a 100 year ticketing system. This will finally bring us into the 21st century, ”he said.
In July, 83 percent of all public transportation shipments in the region used Snapper, and only 5 percent paid in cash. The rest were mostly free rates for SuperGold cardholders and children under the age of 5.
Councilmember David Lee said those numbers showed that cash was no longer needed.
“Cash is a redundant form of payment. . . Covid-19 has given us an even more push on that, ”he said.
In a report presented to councilors Thursday, officials suggest that “Snapper’s extension to the Metlink rail network is worth exploring.”
“We could use aspects of the current Snapper service that has already been provided to Metlink, such as technology, fee structure and data management,” the report reads.
The convenience of paying consistently ranks as one of the worst performing survey sections among Metlink train customers, with 68% satisfaction with train customers, compared to 78% satisfaction with bus customers .
Wellington was originally intended to add card payments to trains in 2015, under an NZTA plan to expand Auckland’s HOP card to the capital.
But when the NZTA approached the Greater Wellington Regional Council in 2015 to adopt the system, the council refused.
Greater Wellington expressed concern that the technology was already out of date. Both AT HOP and Snapper are recharge cards, which even in 2015 were already going out of fashion internationally.
The current national ticketing plan is for an “open circuit” concept that would be linked to an account, rather than a physical card.
It would allow travelers to pay via contactless credit / debit cards, a mobile app linked to a bank account, or with a traditional card.
