PHILADELPHIA (KYW Newsradio) — A new SEPTA program will allow employers to provide a fringe benefit to their workers, by offering them free transportation. SEPTA is hoping the pilot will ultimately boost ridership.
Workers get free rides on any SEPTA vehicle under the “SEPTA Key Advantage” pilot. It works like this: Employers buy six months of passes from SEPTA for $140 per worker.
Then, says SEPTA general manager Leslie Richards, “Their employees will be able to ride SEPTA at no cost to them.”
The aim is to get workers back into the habit of taking transit to work, says SEPTA’s Director of Operating Budgets Erik Johanson.
“There’s a certain power in something that feels free,” Johanson said.
SEPTA says ridership is at 51% of what it was before the pandemic — and if workers are given free rides, Johanson says, then maybe they’ll commute the way many did before COVID-19.
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“It gives them a very significant incentive to use the pass, which we think is going to create a habit of transit use and really start to drive ridership back onto our system,” Johanson said.
The perk will first be offered to employees of Drexel University, Penn Medicine and Wawa, numbering some 16,000 potential riders. They are eligible to apply for the benefit that starts May 1. Workers can receive new SEPTA Key cards, or have the benefit loaded onto their existing card.
SEPTA is already making plans to expand the program to other employers.
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