Category: Press Releases

Northern California’s Sacramento to San Francisco Bay Area intercity passenger rail line is first in the U.S. to let customers tap a bank card to pay on-board

OAKLAND, CA, JANUARY 27, 2023 — With its new pilot program, Tap2Ride, the Capitol Corridor Joint Powers Authority (CCJPA) is bringing the familiar convenience of retail payments to train passengers by allowing riders to “tap” their contactless debit or credit card to pay for train fares, just like they do for groceries and other everyday purchases.

Upon launch, Capitol Corridor will be the first Amtrak-operated intercity passenger rail line in the United States to accept riders’ contactless bank cards for fare payment aboard trains.

“We’re excited to bring our customers the ease and convenience of using their bank cards to tap to pay for train travel along our beautiful 18-stop route in Northern California,” said Rob Padgette, Managing Director of the Capitol Corridor rail service that connects the Sacramento capital region to the San Francisco Bay Area. “This modern approach to fare payment is in line with the free wi-fi, free full-length movies, spacious seating, bike storage, and other amenities we offer on our trains so that it’s both easy and fun to leave the car at home and choose to ride our service for work and leisure.”

The pilot program—dubbed ‘Tap2Ride’—is slated to begin by March 2023, comprised of 200 frequent train riders, with contactless payment readers on both levels of one designated car per train. During the pilot—which is expected to run for several months—Capitol Corridor will seek feedback from participants and determine next steps for a possible expansion of contactless fare payments in the future.

Capitol Corridor is now recruiting pilot participants and is seeking volunteers who represent a wide range of train travel destinations. The fast and easy sign-up form is at capitolcorridor.org/tap2ride, and more pilot information is available in these FAQs.

The Tap2Ride pilot was presented, discussed, and approved at the April 20, 2022, CCJPA Board meeting; view the agenda and video. To launch this pilot, CCJPA tapped Caltrans’ California Integrated Travel Project (Cal-ITP), an initiative—of which CCJPA is the fiscal sponsor—that makes riding by rail and bus in California simpler and more cost-effective, in part by providing free technical assistance to public transportation providers that want to modernize their fare collection systems.

“At Cal-ITP, we want to make it easy for riders to choose public transportation and use the bank card that’s hopefully already in their wallet to pay as they go,” said Gillian Gillett, who leads Cal- ITP, which recently published a case study on how transit agencies can help put debit cards and financial accounts into the hands of unbanked transit customers. “My team is pleased to support Capitol Corridor as they work toward providing passengers with a seamless and interoperable payment experience that’s been proven to increase rail ridership across the globe.”

Capitol Corridor needed an interoperable fare payment method because it runs between two major regions of Northern California that use two different closed-loop transit cards: Clipper in the Bay Area, and Connect Card in Sacramento. Neither Clipper nor Connect Card could be integrated with Amtrak’s federal and state ticketing requirements, and connecting transit agencies on the Sacramento end of the line are looking into accepting contactless debit/credit cards alongside their other fare payment methods.

To bring a more convenient form of fare payment to Capitol Corridor customers, CCJPA elected to pilot accepting contactless open-loop bank cards, the global standard for paying for goods and services. Beginning with registered pilot participants, Capitol Corridor customers will be able to pay for a transit ride the same way they do for other everyday purchases—without stopping to download transit agency-specific apps, juggle exact change, or buy or reload multiple regional farecards.

Pilot participants will also be able to take advantage of distance-based “fare capping”: Tapped fares are automatically calculated based on distance traveled, and they are “capped” at a weekly maximum when a rider taps the same bank card each time they travel between their home station and most frequent destination station on Capitol Corridor. This more equitable method of fare payment allows customers to pay as they go (instead of paying the full price of a pass upfront) and only for the number of train rides they take and the distance they actually travel. Riders can also monitor their fare spending via a convenient web portal.

Passengers who do not have a contactless Visa or Mastercard debit or credit card can order a free contactless-enabled debit card, such as the Cash App Card or Venmo Debit Card.

For the pilot program, CCJPA will be testing trips only on Capitol Corridor trains. CCJPA will not be including bus connections, though CCJPA will be evaluating and evolving the program over the coming months and hopes to offer bus connections in the near future.

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About the Capitol Corridor

Managed by the Capitol Corridor Joint Powers Authority (CCJPA), the Capitol Corridor is an intercity rail service connecting the most economically vibrant urban centers in Northern California—from Auburn/Sacramento to Silicon Valley, and including San Francisco, Oakland, and Berkeley. With free wi-fi on board, Capitol Corridor trains provide a convenient, reliable, and comfortable alternative to the congested I-80, I-680, and I-880 freeways for more than 1.8 million work and leisure travelers every year (prior to the COVID-19 pandemic).

Contact:

Priscilla Kalugdan

media@capitolcorridor.zohodesk.com

(510) 464-6992

About Cal-ITP

The California Integrated Travel Project (Cal-ITP) was established by the California State Transportation Agency (CalSTA) and California Department of Transportation (Caltrans) to both improve and encourage the use of multimodal travel throughout California—by enabling contactless open-loop payments (with debit and credit cards), standardizing information for easy multimodal trip planning, and automating customer discounts (Cal-ITP Benefits). Prior to launching Cal-ITP Benefits, the Cal-ITP team successfully led contactless open-loop payment demonstrations with Monterey-Salinas Transit (MST) as well as public transit agencies in Sacramento and Santa Barbara County. Learn more at calitp.org and on @California_ITP on Twitter, or by subscribing to the Caltrans Mobility Newsletter. And visit Cal-ITP’s CAMobilityMarketplace.org for a catalog of code-compliant products and services for public mobility providers, including contactless payment acceptance hardware and software and discounted cellular data plans.

Contact:

Erika Ehmsen

hello@calitp.org

(916) 378-1312

Sacramento, Calif. (July 8) – A regional partnership led by Capitol Corridor Joint Powers Authority (CCJPA) and its project partners, the City of Sacramento, Sacramento Regional Transit (SacRT), Downtown Railyard Ventures and Sacramento Area Council of Governments (SACOG) were awarded $49,865,000 in funding from the California State Transportation Agency’s “Transit and Intercity Rail Capitol Program.”

Most of the funding will go toward projects in the city of Sacramento. This funding will build improvements at the Sacramento Valley Station (SVS), construct a new regional bus lay-over and vehicle charging facility, new enhanced regional transit stops, and state of the art transit fare payment technology.

“The State of California is the national leader in reducing greenhouse gas emissions, and this funding will better equip the Capital City to lead the way by providing easier access to transit and safe bike routes in our downtown transit hub,” said Mayor Darrell Steinberg. “Big thank you to all of our regional partners who came together to prioritize these important improvements.”

“We are excited that the State shares our vision of the Sacramento Valley Station, underscoring the importance of passenger rail as part of mobility in the Sacramento region,” said Don Saylor CCJPA Board Chair and SACOG Board member. “Their investment will not only establish the station as a transportation hub for the northern California mega-region but will increase the safety and reliability of our rail and transit systems, ultimately improving the overall passenger experience.”

This crucial funding will advance SVS’s transformation into Northern California’s premier rail and transit hub by increasing transit ridership, encouraging transit-oriented development, reducing dependence on the automobile, increasing alternatives to single occupancy vehicle trips for low income and special needs populations and decreasing emissions.

In addition, it will set up the next phase of work that will allow more transit services to serve SVS than any other station in Northern California. SVS will not only be the busiest train station in Northern California but will become a model for statewide efforts that integrate transit and promote efficient land use.

“We are excited for this new regional funding that will improve transit connectivity between regional rail, light rail and bus in the downtown core and work toward a seamless convenient payment option for riders,” said SacRT General Manager and CEO Henry Li. “SacRT looks forward to our continued work with CalSTA, the City of Sacramento, CCJPA and SACOG to help improve mobility and expand intermodal options in our region.”

These interrelated projects will integrate local, regional, and intercity transit/rail service to create new mobility options, improve the transit experience, increase transit ridership, support bus electrification, and advance the region’s climate goals.

Ridership at Sacramento Valley Station is also expected to be positively impacted by the City’s housing policies, confirmed with a “Pro-Housing” designation by California’s Department of Housing and Community Development, the first city to receive such a designation in the state. A significant amount of housing is expected to be added in the Railyards District, adjacent to the station area.

Media Contacts:
Rob Padgette, robp@capitolcorridor.org
Jim Allison, jima@capitolcorridor.org