As more riders return to the buses and subways, the city is slashing the funding that helps to pay the transit fares of low-income New Yorkers.

What You Need To Know


  • The city will spend $65 million less than planned for its Fair Fares program - a half-price MetroCard program for low-income New Yorker.

  • The decrease in spending represents a 61% drop in spending for the Fair Fares program.

  • The budget cuts $5.7 million from the mayor's Better Buses program to speed up bus service.

To balance the budget, Mayor de Blasio and the City Council reduced the Fair Fares program by $65 million dollars - roughly 61%.

"A lot of people can’t get around because they can’t get to work, they can’t get to school because of the price and sometimes, it’s hard," said Kiyana Slade, who works for the Red Hook Initiative, a nonprofit that helps low-income New Yorkers apply for the Fair Fares benefit.

Slade says the program is not as well known as it should be.

“It’s like yea, the trains are maybe not being utilized as much but there are still people using the train and we can’t forget about them," Slade said.

The Fair Fares program began two years ago, and expanded in January.

The mayor's office says the cut reflects a projected reduction in ridership because of the pandemic, and that it will still work to enroll as many New Yorkers as possible.

Also getting the budget axe: $5.7 million from his program to speed bus service by coordinating traffic light signaling and and creating additional bus lanes.

The chop comes at a time when MTA buses are carrying as many or even more riders each day than the subway.

Transit advocates fear the cutbacks could mean the city will be unable to achieve the mayor's goal of creating as many as 20 miles of new bus-only lanes every year.

“Fifteen to 20 miles per year, every year, so that means for 2021 he’s not going to keep his promise," said Stephanie Burgos-Veras, organizing manager for Riders Alliance.

Other efforts to boost bus speeds — like expanding technology that gives buses a priority at intersections, and cameras that automatically ticket cars parked in bus lanes — could be rolled back, transit advocates say.

"It ends up being cuts to staff and cuts to technology and both of those mean it’s going to make it that much harder to achieve that goal of 25% faster bus service by the end of this year," said Nick Sifuentes, director of the Tri-State Transportation Campaign.

Advocates say improving bus service is crucial to reverse a surge of people expected to forgo mass transit for their cars as they return to work amid the coronavirus.

"If we wait too long, til the gridlock starts, it’ll be harder to get that space back," Burgos-Veras said.