Maryland Business

By: Ben Mook

As of this morning’s commute I am officially a field tester of the Maryland Transit Administration’s new Charm Card.

The Charm Card is a rechargeable plastic fare card, just like the Washington Metro’s SmarTrip card. Instead of buying paper passes daily,weekly or monthly you can add money to the card as needed — with the option to load it with weekly or monthly passes as well.

So, I plunked $20 into the vending machine this morning — paying with credit card is apparently forthcoming, but not available yet. And, on the first time out, everything went as expected, with no problems.

I can’t say I was really expecting there to be any problems; it’s not like using rechargeable fare cards is a novel idea.  The SmarTrip card launched in May 1999, and more than a million cards have been issued.

But the MTA is not taking chances. After a two-month field test on the subway system, it’s on to a test of the Light Rail and buses. That means it won’t launch systemwide until some point next year.

I’ll provide updates periodically of how the experiment is faring.