MTA’s ‘green fee’ nets them a fortune and saves them a bundle

New York Daily News
The screen of a MetroCard Vending Machine reminds customers that a $1.00 fee applies to the purchase of new MetroCards.
Daniel Hurst Photography/Getty Images
The green fee generated over $10 million for the MTA in just its first four months.
Bryan Smith for New York Daily News
The MTA expects to print 60 million fewer MetroCards next year - so much plastic that, placed end-to-end, the cards would stretch 3,196 miles, the distance from New York City to Los Angeles and up the West Coast to San Francisco.

PUBLISHED: August 1, 2013 at 2:30 a.m. | UPDATED: January 10, 2019 at 4:39 a.m.

The MTA is raking in the green with its new “green fee.”

The Metropolitan Transportation Authority has hit riders with the $1 “green fee” for a brand-new MetroCard more than 10 million times since the program started in March, the Daily News has learned.

The goal was to encourage riders to recycle and re-use their cards instead of tossing them in the garbage — or on the ground — when they expire or run out of value, officials said.

The MTA expects to print 60 million fewer MetroCards next year – so much plastic that, placed end-to-end, the cards would stretch 3,196 miles, the distance from New York City to Los Angeles and up the West Coast to San Francisco.

It sold 101 million MetroCards last year, said MTA spokesman Adam Lisberg.

In its first four months, the green fee generated $10,841,000 for MTA coffers, said NYC Transit division budget director Aaron Stern. The MTA expects gross revenues to total nearly $24 million this year, and $28 million next year with a combined $3.8 million savings in production costs, said agency officials.

The MTA expects to print 60 million fewer MetroCards next year - so much plastic that, placed end-to-end, the cards would stretch 3,196 miles, the distance from New York City to Los Angeles and up the West Coast to San Francisco. — The MTA expects to print 60 million fewer MetroCards next year – so much plastic that, placed end-to-end, the cards would stretch 3,196 miles, the distance from New York City to Los Angeles and up the West Coast to San Francisco.

Some riders expressed mixed emotions about the fee.

“I don’t agree with the extra charge but it’s a good idea to re-use,” Cheewai Chua, 34, a scientist from Manhattan, said. “It’s friendly to the environment.”

Chua paid the surcharge in March. He’s had the same MetroCard in his wallet since then.

He’s not alone.

In March, only 61% of riders re-used MetroCards when they re-upped, the MTA said. By May and June, that percentage was approximately 87%, officials said.

The green fee generated over $10 million for the MTA in just its first four months.

Gary Ko, 23, a digital marketer from Manhattan, said he’s had the same card since before the surcharge went into effect.

“To save a buck,” he said. “I’m very frugal.”

Evelyn Delorbe, 45, a Spanish language interpreter from Brooklyn, said the fee has resulted in less MetroCard litter in stations.

“It’s been working,” she said of the green fee. “It’s a good idea. It just makes sense.”

The green-fee windfall will be partially offset, officials said, by an estimated $11 million reduction in “fare media liability.” The MTA budget term is used to describe unused value riders leave on MetroCards: small change or trips paid for but not taken.