Crossroads asks UTA to hold the $3 fare until discount passes reach more riders

The Crossroads Urban Center has asked the Utah Transit Authority to postpone a proposed increase in its base fare and to spend money on enrolling riders in the agency's own discount programme first, arguing that the riders a higher fare would hurt most are not yet using the discount available to them 1.

The request came in a letter sent during the comment period on UTA's 2027 budget 1. Crossroads executive director Glenn Bailey asked the agency to include funding for outreach in that budget "and that any increase in prices be paused until that outreach has been completed" 2.

UTA has proposed raising the base fare for local bus, TRAX, bus rapid transit, the S-Line, UTA On Demand and FrontRunner from $2.50 to $3.00, a 20% increase and the first in 13 years 13. The agency's fare schedule published for public review sets out the rest: the local day pass rises from $5.00 to $6.00, the monthly pass from $85.00 to $102.00, and the FrontRunner charge for each additional stop from $0.60 to $0.80 4. Express bus and ski bus fares would go from $5.00 to $6.00 one way and from $170.00 to $204.00 monthly, the group pass from $15.00 to $18.00 and the route-deviation fare from $1.25 to $1.50 4. Paratransit fares, the 10-ride paratransit punch card and the Ride Van Plus rate would not change 4.

The discount programme the letter refers to is the reduced fare: $1 per local trip and $2 per premium trip, available only on a FAREPAY card 5. Riders qualify on disability, household income or enrolment in a Department of Workforce Services programme, or on age — 65 or older, or under 19 5. Disability and age entitlements run five years and income entitlements one year, after which the rider reapplies 5. Since April 12, 2026, reduced fare has been sold only through the Reduced Fare FAREPAY card, applied for online or in person at a UTA customer service location; it is no longer available from ticket machines, the Transit app or in cash at the farebox 8. The $3 card fee is refunded as credit to a rider who qualifies 5. Under the proposal, fare capping would hold a regular local rider to $3 a day and $24 a week, and a reduced-fare rider to $1.20 a day and $9.60 a week 4.

Bill Tibbitts, the organisation's deputy executive director, told Utah News Dispatch that the increase would arrive at "a really bad time," citing a cost of living that has left close to half of Americans struggling to pay for basic needs 1. "I would feel better about a price increase if I knew that the people who are going to be hurt by it the most were all enrolled in the discount pass program. I am not confident that that's the case," Tibbitts told Utah News Dispatch 1. He proposed that the agency pause, make its discount programmes work, and raise prices afterwards only if the resulting revenue proved insufficient 1.

The record he is arguing from is thin on the central number: UTA has not published how many riders use the reduced-fare programme 1. Nationally, fewer than one in three eligible people enrol in discounted fare programmes, according to the Urban Institute, a think tank 1. In Salt Lake City, the Hive Pass, which gave residents access to buses and TRAX for $42 a month, was terminated in the last city budget cycle after averaging 443 users a month 1.

Crossroads gives out one-day UTA passes at its downtown Salt Lake City food pantry, 50 of them each weekday, and Tibbitts told Utah News Dispatch they are gone within an hour or two while the pantries see more than 12,000 people a month 1. "There's room for real growth," he said 1.

UTA officials had not reviewed the letter when Utah News Dispatch asked them about it last week 1. Gavin Gustafson, a public information officer at the authority, told Utah News Dispatch on Friday that proposals are not final and that all comments received will be considered before any decision is made. "We're still in the evaluation process at this point," he said 1. Mike Caldwell, chairman of the UTA Transit Commission, said the agency is "interested in everyone's feedback" 2.

Crossroads is not alone in asking for a pause. Powerful Moms Who Care, a Salt Lake City grassroots group, has asked for no fare increase at all, for discounts and transit benefits to be made more accessible, and for riders to keep the option of paying cash; it has launched a comment-writing petition 2. Its community organiser, Dawn Lueck, told a UTA budget hearing on Monday evening that "public transportation is a public good," and that all riders should be considered in planning 2.

The revenue at stake is small relative to the budget it sits in. Fare collection is forecast to provide about 4% of UTA's 2027 revenue, out of a total forecast near $685 million, according to data presented to the UTA Transit Commission 2. Sales taxes account for 54%, capital sources 22% and federal funds 8%, and an estimated 9% would come from the authority's savings 2.

The comparison that has driven coverage of the proposal is with other agencies. Of 163 transit agencies surveyed in 2025 by the American Public Transportation Association, UTA's proposed $3 fare would be tied for the highest 3. Gustafson told The Salt Lake Tribune the comparison is imperfect, noting that the Seattle and San Francisco metropolitan areas have around four times the population and more riders funding their systems 3. Christopher Stout, co-founder of the Utah Transit Riders Union, opposed the increase on service grounds, telling the Tribune that 15-minute frequent bus service was cut back after the pandemic and that riders paying $3 "are getting less service" than five or ten years ago 3.

For riders in this paper's coverage area, the change lands on the lines that reach it. The TRAX Blue Line's southern end is Draper Town Center at 1131 E. Pioneer Road, and the Red Line's South Jordan stops are at Daybreak Parkway, 11405 S. Grandville Ave., and South Jordan Parkway, 10605 S. Grandville Ave. 7. A monthly local pass would rise from $85 to $102 4. One TRAX rider in Sandy, Lesley Alvarez, told the Tribune that she spends about $100 a month getting to work in Taylorsville without a car, and that the increase would cost her about $20 more a month 3.

The authority's formal comment period on the 2027 service and fare changes ran from Aug. 10 to Sept. 9, with a virtual public meeting on Aug. 26 6. UTA says it will keep collecting comment before finalising the budget 2. The decision on rates is expected by Dec. 9, alongside the budget and changes intended to widen how riders can pay 2; the agency is separately proposing to accept credit and debit cards and mobile wallets at the reader, and to open the S-Line extension to Highland Drive and Simpson Avenue in August 2027 6. The fare schedule published for review is titled for implementation in 2027, and the Tribune reported the higher fares could take effect as early as spring 2027 34.

The body that will have input on the rate is a seven-member transit commission that replaced UTA's board of trustees, as the Tribune reported in August, and the final decision rests with the agency's executive officers once they have reviewed the public comment 3. The board of trustees was still meeting under that name on June 10, 2026, when its agenda listed a report from executive director Jay Fox at UTA's FrontLines headquarters, 669 W. 200 South in Salt Lake City — the same address where the agency held a public open house on the proposal on Monday at 5:30 p.m. 19.