The dozens of Red Line commuters I interviewed this morning riding between Harvard Square and South Station met the first day of increased transit fares with all the outrage of someone who just discovered that the sun rises in the East and sets in the West.
Maybe T riders are getting used to it. This, after all, is the second fare increase in as many years.
In July 2012, fares increased an average of 23 percent.
The damage was less intense this year.
Local bus and transit fare are up — respectively — by 10 cents to $1.60 and $2.10.
Senior citizen and student fares jumped a nickle.
Monthly LinkPasses cost $5 more.
All told, the new fares are expected to increase MBTA revenues by 4 percent.
“Ten cents is pretty small,” said grad student and veteran Orange Line rider Maya Rana.
Commuter Maxfield Gaj expressed some mild frustration on his way to Faneuil Hall.
“I feel like if they’re going to hike the prices then we ought to be getting more out of it," said Gaj, who had given the issue some thought. "They did just extend the hours, but it still doesn’t go that late. I know Boston’s not as big a city as New York, but you’d hope that we’d have some kind of 24-hour transportation other than just taxis.”
Still, Gaj isn’t outraged.
“I live in the Harvard area and I take the 73 bus every day. It’s still a pretty good deal," he said. "It’d be like a $10 round trip commute for me. Instead, I just get a monthly pass and it’s paid for immediately.”
