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So last year the MBTA (Boston’s public transit system) upped its subway fares by 25 percent. The system still runs on tokens, and, as many Bostonians were wont to do, I decided to buy a few extra tokens just before the price increase.
Tokens can be bought in rolls of 40, and because it wound up being more convenient, I continued buying my tokens in rolls throughout the year. As a side effect, this also gave me the ability to see exactly how many tokens I wound up spending on the T over the course of the year. I used just under three rolls, or 114 tokens, which excludes several tokens that I found in the coin returns of the T’s antiquated turnstiles.
Now, the T also offers monthly subway passes. They cost a fixed $44, so the point where the pass becomes cheaper than the $1.25 tokens is on one’s 18th round-trip ride of the month, or 36th one-way trip of the month.
Since I averaged less than 5 round trips per month (9.5 one-way rides), the tokens are clearly the way to go. By buying tokens instead of passes, I saved myself over $385 over the course of the year.
But really, for me the most interesting thing is that I took essentially 57 round-trip rides on the subway last year, and that three rolls of tokens ($150) is sufficient to get me through a whole year.
Of course, this will all change late in 2005, because the MBTA is allegedly switching over to a stored-value card system. But at least now I’ve got a good idea what to put on my card!