Metrolink Cuts Fares, Travel Time to Attract Riders

Metrolink offered bonuses of money and time to some commuters Friday, lowering fares for Ventura County residents who commute to the San Fernando Valley and promising swifter trips downtown for Santa Clarita commuters.

The travel time between Santa Clarita and Union Station on the new commuter rail system will decrease by 12 minutes as part of an overall effort to reduce commuting times throughout the system beginning the week of Nov. 30, said Metrolink spokesman Peter Hidalgo.

It now takes commuters one hour and nine minutes to travel between the two locations, Hidalgo said.

In another move to boost ridership, commuters boarding Metrolink trains in Simi Valley will pay less for tickets beginning Dec. 1, transit officials said. They indicated that the fare reductions may spread someday to Santa Clarita.

The change came after many Simi Valley residents working in the San Fernando Valley complained that the fares, geared toward downtown commuters, are too high.

Directors of the Southern California Regional Rail Authority voted unanimously to shift Simi Valley to a different fare zone, lowering the price of one-way single-trip tickets from Simi Valley by $1.

The cost of a monthly pass between Simi Valley and Burbank or downtown L.A. will drop from $176 to $144; between Simi Valley and Van Nuys from $144 to $112, and between Simi Valley and Chatsworth from $112 to $80.

“It was a question of looking at the equity,” said Jacki Bacharach, chairwoman of the five-county rail authority. “We had put Simi Valley into a zone as though everybody was going to make the trip downtown. This has made us much more sensitive to the different travel patterns we’re seeing.”

Intermediate-stop commuters on the Santa Clarita line also have told Metrolink officials that they would like a decrease in fares, said Annette Colfax, director of passenger facilities and coordination.

She said that although Santa Clarita riders have not protested as vigorously as Simi Valley riders, she did not rule out future fare decreases on the Santa Clarita line.

“Our next step is to look at the entire system and see if other changes make sense,” Colfax said. “We’ve looked at the Santa Clarita line and we want to hold off making any changes there until we look at the whole system.”

But the Simi Valley change was the first and only fare change approved by the board Friday after a review of Metrolink’s first three weeks of operation. The commuter system was free during its first week.

Although the rail authority board told its staff to review other possible zone changes, Bacharach said the board is not moving to slash fares for the entire system.

“I don’t foresee that happening immediately because we have to see what our revenue is against expenses,” she said. “That will take a little more time.”

Travel times to Union Station also will be cut by 17 minutes on the Ventura County line, which originates in Moorpark, and by nine minutes on the San Bernardino line, which starts in Pomona.

The time improvements are partly the result of track and signal improvements. Train operators and dispatchers also are becoming more familiar with Metrolink operations, Colfax said. “We think we can run a tighter operation now.”

New timetables are being prepared, Metrolink officials said.

The fare reduction for Simi Valley riders was hailed by Simi Valley Councilman Bill Davis, Ventura County’s representative on the regional rail board. Davis said he has heard many complaints from local commuters about the high cost of Metrolink trips to the San Fernando Valley.

“You’re talking $2.50 from here to Chatsworth, where it was $3.50,” Davis said. “I think the people who work over there would be willing to pay the $5, but maybe not the $7.

“We’ll now see if more of the short-run riders will want to ride the train.”

Richard Stanger, executive director of Metrolink, estimated that about 30 passengers a day are riding from Simi Valley to Chatsworth, and another 50 to Burbank.

Stanger said the zone change was justified because Simi Valley is only 6.4 track miles from Chatsworth, but 11 miles from Moorpark.

During its first week of free service, the Ventura County line carried as many as 1,200 riders in each direction. That figure was cut in half when the system began charging fares, but Metrolink officials said ridership is slowly increasing.

Fares from the Moorpark station will not be changed.

Moorpark Mayor Paul Lawrason, who rides Metrolink regularly to his job in Chatsworth, said he does not believe Moorpark commuters will drive to the Simi Valley station to save on tickets.

But he said some people living in areas between the stations may be lured by the lower fares. “The people on the borderline obviously will opt for the Simi station,” he said.