Get ready to say goodbye to the end of an era next month, when SEPTA officially stops selling its—somewhat—beloved tokens everywhere.
The transportation authority announced Thursday that all token sales will finally cease on April 30th. Riders will still be able to use their tokens for the foreseeable future—lest your $2 go to waste—but won’t be able to purchase any new ones starting May 1, according to a statement from SEPTA.
Instead, regular riders will have to buy SEPTA Key cards, and SEPTA is urging riders to make the switch soon. The price for a new Key card will shoot up to $4.95 starting in May.
Thursday’s announcement marks the end to a long token phase-out process. In early 2017, SEPTA introduced Key cards, plastic cards that can be reloaded with money and can be used on all modes of transportation in the city. That began the process of ridding the city of its SEPTA tokens, which have been accepted at stations in the city since 1968.
Many vending machines that sold the tokens were removed from stations by December. Earlier this month, SEPTA announced that they were stopping token sales at a number of Regional Rail stations.
Now, SEPTA says they’ll continue to sell the tokens in bulk to social service agencies beyond the April 30 cutoff date, but that’s merely until those organizations can find a new way to provide SEPTA fares to their clients, according to the statement.
“The end of token sales represents a major step forward in the implementation of the SEPTA Key,” said General Manager of SEPTA Jeffrey Knueppel in the statement.
- SEPTA tokens will be phased out [Curbed Philly]