It has been a few months since the Ad Hoc Eco Pass Committee first began its work . . . and there is much progress to report.

As you may remember, the purpose of the Ad Hoc Committee is to develop a recommended pricing formula for all forms of the Eco Pass (business, neighborhoods and universities).  The pricing formula is expected to incorporate ridership data that new RTD fareboxes have the ability to collect, including the aggregation of data by specific Eco Pass groups.

The Ad Hoc Committee began by focusing on underlying values that will guide its work.  The primary values the Committee members arrived at are that the Eco Pass program must be “economically sustainable for RTD while increasing ridership.”  The group also recognizes that, with all the ridership data the new fareboxes are designed to provide, RTD will have the ability to price Eco Passes at a collective rate which guarantee the agency receives compensation that is comparable to the transit services it provides.

With these key parameters to guide us, a separate working group of RTD staff and Eco Pass stakeholders has been meeting to see if they can arrive at a consensus pricing formula to recommend to the Committee.  They have narrowed the options they are considering to just a few, one which assesses pricing based on proximity to service while another considers actual ridership levels.  There is third pricing option that the working group also is reviewing, the Master Pass concept that Director Jack O’Boyle crafted, which ties pricing to group size.

I am not certain where the working group will land in its recommendation, or if they will punt on a single recommendation and present various options to the Committee.  Either way, for my part, I will be looking to make sure that the pricing formula the Ad Hoc Committee finally presents to the RTD Board maintains the incentive for Eco Pass holders to use transit.  This means that there should be little direct tie between individual use and the price for the Eco Pass.

For now, that is where things stand on the Eco Pass front.  The Ad Hoc Committee is schedule to hear the working group’s recommendations at a meeting in early September with the goal of presenting a final pricing proposal to the RTD Board in October.  Stay tuned to this site for further updates on how the Committee’s work is proceeding and feel free to let me know, along the way, if you have any input regarding the Ad Hoc Committee’s efforts.