Apple Pay for Transit Now Works in These 12 U.S. Cities

[dontwalkhand]

My Clipper card is already done, but took the leap since I seldom use it and no crisis if phone lost, etc. and I DO have the original senior card thus facilitating a new install in a replacement phone. I will check out on that locally (DC) and may take the leap. I DID inquire a while back at a kiosk and was told your physical card is rendered useless- but if I can hang onto it could be time.

They always render the physical card useless as technically you’re only allowed one transit credential at a time. (This is also why you can’t load the same credential on both a phone and an Apple Watch).

 

[Nekronos]

There’s also a lot of cities that take Apple Pay directly on the reader, and just aren’t listed here, probably because they didn’t pay Apple. Dallas, Miami, etc all let you Apple Pay directly on fareboxes. Miami has Express Transit working as well.

Guess somehow Miami isn’t worthy of Apple advertising that it works, but somehow Orange County does…

I think the article could explain this better but this is not talking about tap to pay via apple pay - that obviously works at a lot of places.

Transit mode is different and requires the reader you are interfacing to be configured/identified as transit.

 

[RevTEG]

The “Bay Area” listed as a single city? 🤷🏻 Ok….

 

[DailySlow]

They always render the physical card useless as technically you’re only allowed one transit credential at a time. (This is also why you can’t load the same credential on both a phone and an Apple Watch).

Well I want the keep the physical card (yes it’s mothballed) makes it much simpler to set up again with its unique reg number when zombie apocalypse hits.

 

[germanbeer007]

Cars don't need to stop????????? Traffic lights??????????

discussing boring company tunnels?????????? there are far less stops in boring company tunnels than subways?????

 

[germanbeer007]

Boring Company tunnels will NEVER compete with heavy metro systems. That's just a fact of physics.

They already beat ridership of a subway line in SF in a day. It's just a fact.

Also - Yes, snow does stop trains above ground. But not for long. The trains are running LONG before the roads return to full capacity.

Not my experience. I went to Sapporo for snow festival. Trains were shutdown for several hours. buses were packed. Massive queue. My only other option was to taxi from CTS which also had a long line.

In fact, if transit agencies were as smart as the one in Hong Kong, there wouldn't be ANY subsidies. HK keeps the land around the station and leases it to private developers. The lease payments make up for the "losses" on the rail system.

I've discussed with plenty of transit people and they always point to international countries. Problem is, how exactly do you translate that solution to USA? It's easy to say "well just do this, remove this law, bring this company from Japan to build it for cheap, and tadaaa, super cheap and efficient subway system", but in reality, that's just not how it works.

 

[germanbeer007]

You are completely missing the point of the article and the iphone feature. I HAVE the capability to use ApplePay and ride anywhere in major cities NOW, just like millions of other riders each year. THAT is the point of this feature being released now. and it's a GREAT feature. Personally, I serve as a very useful example of how great this is. My daughter lives in NYC, I do not. She uses this feature daily. When I come visit and we explore the city, I don't need to buy subway tickets or get some sort of transit pass. I pull out my phone. Done. It's very rare that she and I take an uber in town. It's just not worth it.

I'm discussing capabilities of The Boring Company.

There MIGHT be an option, perhaps maybe someday in our lifetimes, to ride a Boring tunnel somewhere useful. Maybe. There MIGHT be an opportunity to ride an AI-powered car in the next few years to somewhere useful.

It's already here.

Maybe. But skipping the overall cost to infrastructure and society of one over another, are thousands and thousands of people a day in a big city going to spend 3x, 5x, 10x or more to get to their city destination more slowly when you can ride the subway for a couple of bucks and get to the same place faster?

Boring Company self funds the tunnels. City spends $0.

Last time I was in NYC I had to get from Harlem to Brooklyn, with a coworker, on a rainy day. He and i traveled to our destination at different times. I took the subway and, for $3 I was there in something like 40 minutes. He took an Uber and it took him over 2 hours and cost him well over $100.

Sounds like Boring Company can solve that in NYC.

I fail to understand how the Boring Company does anything beyond digging a tunnel for cars to go through. New York has tunnels. They carry cars (and trains). Why is the Boring company even part of the argument here?

Boring Company builds tunnels for $10m/mile (and dropping). NYC tunnels cost billions per mile.

For Boring and Waymo, my suggestion is to look at places like Pittsburgh, as many autonomous driving companies have done. small-to-midsize city, with very complex roads. A subway that only goes south from downtown. No subways north, east, or west. Mass transit is buses, and they are not looked upon favorably by the car-owning sect. The surrounding city and close suburbs are ripe for improvements to mass transit, but the city doesn't have "big" money for infrastructure projects like that, and building subways to the unserved areas would cost massive amounts of money given the hilly geography. Get the boring company to make a tunnel from Pittsburgh to any distance north of the city then report back to us.

Again, boring company self funds the tunnels at no cost to the cities. They're building Vegas Loop and Nashville Loop with zero tax dollars.

Why are you so against letting Elon waste his money?

 

[Fallforward]

FYI trains have huge negative externalities above ground. Extremely loud, rumble the buildings nearby, train yards are extremely bad for the environment, etc..

Also government data shows Teslas are on average more energy efficient than trains. Tesla robotaxis are simply way better for cities than legacy public transport. And it's only going to get better with the robovan (higher capacity)

You lived in next to a train line for a month and that makes you an expert on noise? I lived near the Chuo and then Yamanote lines above ground in Tokyo for years and never had such issues. The rush hour commute was crowded (Yamanote to Tozi line had door pushers) but wonderfully efficient. For longer travel, it was amazing how easy it was to get to the Shinkansen and travel across the country. When my boss invited me to dinner with his family, we decided to see whether I could beat him to his home by train versus his chauffeur driven car. I beat him.

No government data shows Teslas are on average more energy efficient than trains on a per passenger mile basis. Also, if you want all-on costs, then road building and maintenance is a factor.

EV efficiency depends on what is included in the measurement. It looks best when measured from battery to wheel. It's less when measured from energy source (Solar/mass battery, extracting transorting gas, oil, coal) to generation, then net of energy loss from transmission, and loss from charging the EV battery, to wheel. Just the act of charging an EV battery at a charge station causes significant energy loss (DC Fast 3-8%, 240V up to 10% and 120V up to 15%).

 

[germanbeer007]

You lived in next to a train line for a month and that makes you an expert on noise? I lived near the Chuo and then Yamanote lines above ground in Tokyo for years and never had such issues.

Cumulatively I lived in Tokyo for many years in many different areas. You lived in one area and that makes you an expert in train noise all over Tokyo?

Go visit this family mart: https://maps.app.goo.gl/fcEikaufeRrQQk9H6

You can literally see the glass shake every time the train passes.

The rush hour commute was crowded (Yamanote to Tozi line had door pushers) but wonderfully efficient. For longer travel, it was amazing how easy it was to get to the Shinkansen and travel across the country. When my boss invited me to dinner with his family, we decided to see whether I could beat him to his home by train versus his chauffeur driven car. I beat him.

Wonderfully? I was riding up the escalator at Yokohama station during rush hour to get to the airport, they literally slammed on the escalator's emergency stop button because there was no more room to get people onto the station because so many people can't get on the subways fast enough to clear the space. Every arrival of the train had no room and only a few people got on each time.

No government data shows Teslas are on average more energy efficient than trains on a per passenger mile basis.

False. NTD showed HR average across USA is 408.6 Wh/pax-mile. LR average showing 510 Wh/pax-mile. 2019 data.
Department of energy showing a 2021 Model Y having 270 Wh/mile for just 1 passenger.

EV efficiency depends on what is included in the measurement. It looks best when measured from battery to wheel. It's less when measured from energy source (Solar/mass battery, extracting transorting gas, oil, coal) to generation, then net of energy loss from transmission, and loss from charging the EV battery, to wheel. Just the act of charging an EV battery at a charge station causes significant energy loss (DC Fast 3-8%, 240V up to 10% and 120V up to 15%).

Even factoring energy loss while charging + extra weight + temperature accommodations, it's still less than 408.6 Wh/pax-mile. And that's not even the latest Model Y which uses even less energy and the cybercab which already started production will use even less energy AND the fact that we're discussing only 1 passenger in a car. Put 2 passengers in a car and 270 Wh/mile effectively halves to ~135 Wh/pax-mile (average SUV occupancy in USA is 1.9 passengers).

And even if you somehow fudged the numbers to show Teslas are worse, factor in a train's dead headings while a boring company tunnel station lets teslas sit idle in the loading bay waiting for passengers to pick up.

 

[erinsarah]

I'm discussing capabilities of The Boring Company.



It's already here.



Boring Company self funds the tunnels. City spends $0.




Sounds like Boring Company can solve that in NYC.



Boring Company builds tunnels for $10m/mile (and dropping). NYC tunnels cost billions per mile.




Again, boring company self funds the tunnels at no cost to the cities. They're building Vegas Loop and Nashville Loop with zero tax dollars.

Why are you so against letting Elon waste his money?

Not against him wasting money at all. If he can somehow magically make this happen, great...see my notes about Pittsburgh (or Nashville). But going back to your original comment, "not sure what's the point when Waymo and Tesla robotaxis are going to make these legacy transit options obsolete", exactly how many years do you expect, if all goes exactly as you envision, that there would be a functional replacement for the existing subway system in that list of major cities that instead runs through Musk tunnels with individual autonomous cars running at a price that people can afford to take five times a day? One year? 12 years? Given that there is NO plan to make a Musk tunnel in NYC as far as I'm aware, I'm thinking this is an iPhone feature that's going to provide a decade of convenience for people.

Also, who is to say that the feature wouldn't be useful when traveling a Musk Tunnel some day?

 

[germanbeer007]

Not against him wasting money at all. If he can somehow magically make this happen, great...see my notes about Pittsburgh (or Nashville).

Yep Nashville is happening. They already started construction.

But going back to your original comment, "not sure what's the point when Waymo and Tesla robotaxis are going to make these legacy transit options obsolete", exactly how many years do you expect, if all goes exactly as you envision, that there would be a functional replacement for the existing subway system in that list of major cities that instead runs through Musk tunnels with individual autonomous cars running at a price that people can afford to take five times a day? One year? 12 years? Given that there is NO plan to make a Musk tunnel in NYC as far as I'm aware, I'm thinking this is an iPhone feature that's going to provide a decade of convenience for people.

Depends on the city. With the Vegas loop, the slowest part isn't tunnel construction but rather the permits. Boring Company is working with the city so that there's a standardized framework. Instead of getting a permit for each segment of the 60 mile tunnel system, they're going to have one set of permits for the entire city. If that happens, the can easily finish 60 miles of the tunnel system in 5 years (they already have the technology to do so).

Also, who is to say that the feature wouldn't be useful when traveling a Musk Tunnel some day?

Not sure how. If you tap to get in the car, you'd still want to enter the address somehow. It's far easier to download the app and type in the destination with your phone than to use the car's touchscreen.

 

[dontwalkhand]

discussing boring company tunnels?????????? there are far less stops in boring company tunnels than subways?????

Doesn’t less stops mean lesser places you can go?

 

[CarlJ]

Tech bro transit is not transit.

The thing is, it possibly could be, in 25 years or so. The problem is they're alpha testing / beta testing it all in public now, while saying "relax, guy, it's totally safe!", because it's beneficial to them to say that rather than because it's true.

 

[dontwalkhand]

Not sure how. If you tap to get in the car, you'd still want to enter the address somehow. It's far easier to download the app and type in the destination with your phone than to use the car's touchscreen.

The idea is to be less reliant on third party apps and be able to get most of what you need done with the ones that come with the OS. As much as I think the Tesla tunnels will fail, tapping and entering the destination on a touch screen is going to be better than having to force people to download yet another app. These transport apps do nothing but silo transit from each other unlike say Apple Maps that can tie a bus, a train and a stupid musk car into one plan.

 

[germanbeer007]

Doesn’t less stops mean lesser places you can go?

no?

going from Shibuya station to asakusa station requires 18 stops for a train. Boring Company tunnels don't need to stop at every station to take you to asakusa. Every station has an express lane by design so it skips over stations it doesn't need to stop at. It will probably involve a traffic light to get on the main artery tunnel but that's probably it if any.

 

[germanbeer007]

The idea is to be less reliant on third party apps and be able to get most of what you need done with the ones that come with the OS. As much as I think the Tesla tunnels will fail, tapping and entering the destination on a touch screen is going to be better than having to force people to download yet another app.

if you've ever used a Waymo, typing in an address on the floor screen in the backseat is such a bad experience that most people would prefer to use an app change a destination.

 

[germanbeer007]

The thing is, it possibly could be, in 25 years or so. The problem is they're alpha testing / beta testing it all in public now, while saying "relax, guy, it's totally safe!", because it's beneficial to them to say that rather than because it's true.

Vegas Loop follows NFPA-130/NFPA-502 national safety standards, same as subways. Fire department reviewed this and signed off.

It's safe. It's literally safer than subways actually.

 

[steve62388]

I wish visa would fix this transit vulnerability.

 

[dontwalkhand]

I wish visa would fix this transit vulnerability.

The fact that you have to tap the android phone at the same time as someone tapping your iPhone and having your bank approve the transaction at the same time while trying to assume you have Express mode enabled on a Visa is really really slim.

MKBHD is doing what he does best, clickbait.

 

[seek3r]

Sounds like Boring Company can solve that in NYC.

it's already solved, that was GP's point...

Boring Company builds tunnels for $10m/mile (and dropping). NYC tunnels cost billions per mile.

Do you really think the cost is because of the difficulties of building a tunnel in general? The amount of buried infrastructure in NYC is the biggest single problem.

And again, can you imagine how much tunnel you'd need of teslas driving around to even replace one subway line?

I'm getting the impression you've never actually been on a real mass transit system

 

[Edd70]

If I have to “set it up” in Apple Wallet, is this really saving me effort? Wouldn’t downloading the actual train app be equally simple? What does this get me? Just one less app on the phone?

 

[germanbeer007]

it's already solved, that was GP's point...

Nope.

NYC Transit System Faces $432 Million Budget Gap, DiNapoli Says

New York City’s transit system faces a potential $432 million budget shortfall this year because the subway, bus and commuter rail operator may need to wait until 2026 to get reimbursed from federal money owed for cleaning costs during the Covid pandemic, according to a report from Thomas...

www.bloomberg.com

Report: MTA could face a $3 billion budget shortfall by 2028

The report comes from the state comptroller.

ny1.com

I mean, by your logic, why not just spend $1 trillion on subways in Los Angeles?

Do you really think the cost is because of the difficulties of building a tunnel in general? The amount of buried infrastructure in NYC is the biggest single problem.

largely untrue.
the station size, the requirement for overstaffing, and the fragmented administration (hiring sub contractors which hires sub sub contractors, etc..) are the main reasons.

with boring company, a station size can take as little as a few parking spaces, or it can take up a multilevel parking garage, vertically integrate the tunnel construction which reduces amount of staff and reduces the need for that many subcontractors.

plus, you need a large *surface* area for train yards while Boring Company can store just as many seats, if not, more seats that take up less than a fraction of a train yard's *surface* area.

looking at maintenance, MTA says they rebuild every single train car every 6 years along with standard train maintenance. with a Tesla, all you need to really deal with is tire rotations and windshield wiper fluid. don't need a train yard maintenance build or crew to do that lol.

boring company is just objectively more cost efficient and reduces footprint compared to a subway.

And again, can you imagine how much tunnel you'd need of teslas driving around to even replace one subway line?

they already beat a subway line's daily ridership with ~70 teslas.

I'm getting the impression you've never actually been on a real mass transit system

I lived in Tokyo from January to April of this year. last year I only did 2 weeks, but 2024 I did 3 months. 2023 did the same thing too. And 2019, and so on...have pictures from each year to prove it if you like. can't reverse image these as these images were never uploaded to the internet. also have Google Maps history of places I visited in tokyo for this year I can screenshot for you. you can give me a date and I'll show you a pic of the location history for that day as well.

I've used one of the world's best subway systems probably more than you have.

I stand by what I said.

 

[dontwalkhand]

If I have to “set it up” in Apple Wallet, is this really saving me effort? Wouldn’t downloading the actual train app be equally simple? What does this get me? Just one less app on the phone?

Downloading the app usually requires you to also set up an account, etc. Adding it through Wallet app is way less steps. That being said, some will still require you to download their app, Chicago, and Portland come to mind.

 

[seek3r]

they already beat a subway line's daily ridership with ~70 teslas.

I've used one of the world's best subway systems probably more than you have.

I’m literally from NYC, so I kinda doubt it

I stand by what I said.

I honestly can’t tell if you actually believe this, but on the off chance you do I just want to point out, all the other absurdities aside, that to move the number of people the New York City subway does in any given day using Teslas in tunnels. You would need about 4 million Teslas base, and a lot more to handle spikes. That’s roughly half the entire production of all cars Tesla has *ever* made, and the surplus needed to handle spikes would eat most of the rest. Just for NYC. Consider that

 

[germanbeer007]

I’m literally from NYC, so I kinda doubt it

I didn't say NYC subway line. It beat a subway line in SF.

But ok the Frank Avenue Shuttle subway line only does 10k/day. Boring company already did 30k/day. So literally you're wrong.

You would need about 4 million Teslas base, and a lot more to handle spikes.

Show your work.

Because quick math suggests that's already wrong. Avg weekday ridership subway is about 4 million. A Tesla has 5 seats. Why would you need 4 million Teslas when it can fit 5 people per Tesla? Are you saying no one will ever want to split a robotaxi fare even if they both are going to and from the same location? Family/friends going to the same school? Coworkers going to the same lunch/dinner/drinks place?

You're saying 1 Tesla can only carry one person to work. And you must use a different Tesla to take that same person back from work to home. That's ridiculous. Surely you understand that 1 Tesla can carry out more than 1 journey per day, right?