New Yorkers have gotten around their cities by subways, buses, elevated trains, streetcars and ferries. And the ways in which they have paid for them have changed as well. And keeps changing!
This month, the city is saying farewell to the MetroCard, the magnetic-stripe card that has gotten the town moving since the early 1990s. When the orange cards debuted, they replaced the strange physical tokens commuters had been using since 1953.
Mass transit fares were also a key issue in the past New York mayoral race — and they’ve always been a key issue for voters since the late 19th century. That’s part of the reason that fares famously remained five cents for decades. But as the subway system expanded, stretching through Brooklyn, Queens, and the Bronx, it soon became evident that it was becoming too expensive to operate.
But changing the price is one thing; going from currency to token to MetroCard to OMNI (our latest method) requires technical modifications of every station in the system. In 1953, that entire system changed — literally overnight — to accommodate the first tokens.
Jodi Shapiro of the New York Transit Museum joins the podcast to discuss the museum’s latest exhibition, FAREwell MetroCard, which celebrates the newly retired fare system.
LISTEN TODAY: SUBWAY TOKENS, METROCARDS AND OTHER HISTORIC FARE
FURTHER LISTENING
The Bowery Boys Podcast is proud to be sponsored by Founded By NYC, celebrating New York City’s 400th anniversary in 2025 and the 250th anniversary of the United States in 2026.
Read about all the exciting events and world-class institutions commemorating the five boroughs’’ legacy of groundbreaking achievements, and find ways to celebrate the city that’s always making history at Founded By NYC.