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“The RFID cards, however, are far more durable than the flimsy MetroCards that NYC uses.”

Absolutely, when I lived in Chicago I had their RFID card which was relatively durable. And you could refill the balance online iirc. I moved to NYC in 2007 and eventually got used to the flimsy metrocards, always hoping that they’d get it together and get a contactless system in place.

Well, it finally happened in NYC. I took the subway for the first time since the pandemic started not too long ago and all of the transit in the city has the new Omny card system. It just uses my default Apple Pay card and that’s it. No passcode, faceid, etc. I just waved my phone in front of it, my card gets charged, and the turnstile is open.

And it works on buses too! Finally no more having to run to a subway station to find a metrocard machine to refill my balance when I want to take the bus.

In what way are Metrocards flimsy?

After living in NYC for six years, it was actually nice to not have a full-sized, extra card just for transit but one that was super slim, flexible and barely takes up any room in a wallet.

Same question. I’m a lifelong NYer, and a metro card has never failed in me in use or in structural integrity. I tend to replace them every five years or so for eventually /losing/ them, but that’s it. What more could you ask for?

I really like Bangkok's integrations where the card you use for the BTS also works with some food courts, so it's an extra incentive to store it (you get to leave the airport and grab a meal without even having to go to an ATM!)

Although having the BTS, MTR, and SkyTrain managed differently means having to store 3 thick cards plus extra cards for some food courts just for a single city.

Do the subways in Chinese cities have a system where you can just load the cards onto your phone? Hmm, now that I think about it not many Chinese phones have NFC.

NFC isn't common in China. QR codes rule everything and are the standard way to do contactless payments in China. There are recently some cities e.g. Guangzhou that are implementing Wechat QR code scan entry to metros as an option. They claim to have it down to 0.2 seconds which if true is impressive. I haven't tried it. I find the physical cards easier since you don't have to fumble with the phone's UI, they aren't dependent on batteries, and you can shove them in your phone case and forget about them.

I've never used a QR code based system, but it seems to me like it could be the best of both worlds.

> I find the physical cards easier since you don't have to fumble with the phone's UI, they aren't dependent on batteries, and you can shove them in your phone case and forget about them.

So... print out the QR code and shove it in your phone case and forget about it?

And if you forget / lose / break the print-out, but still have your phone, you're good to go.

> So... print out the QR code and shove it in your phone case and forget about it?

That won't work. WeChat and AliPay QR codes change every minute for security, if you are paying from an account with a QR code.

You can pay to a statically printed QR code by scanning it with your camera (streetside food sellers do this), but you cannot pay from a static code.

That's too bad... Are they generated by a central server or are they based on a fixed seed, like OTP codes?

I'm wondering whether this could be implemented on some kind of low-powered e-ink device like some OTP tokens.

I'm pretty sure it's a weird hybrid of a mostly centralized system and some on-device for the case where the user has momentary reception loss but the merchant still has a solid internet connection. I'm pretty sure you can't be without reception for too long, it's not like an OTP key.

The mobile app is very opaque and not decompiler-friendly, so I can't say with 100% certainty what it is.

As far as a low-powered electronic device I think that's exactly what an RFID card is, and they work very well. The only real downside is lack of inter-city recognition of RFID systems, but I suppose the reality is most people only travel frequently between a consistent set of 1-3 cities and not usually more than that. My RFID "brick" of 20+ cards is quite the exception, and I'm more of a public transit enthusiast than most people, who usually just take taxis/rideshares when they travel to unfamiliar cities.

Typically how these work is that the client caches some small number (i.e. 5-10) offline tokens for use when you have no connectivity. They also expire after 24 hours.

The same in Japan, the Tokyo subway is actually run by several network operators, so sometimes when you change trains you have to exit one operator's station area and enter another one, and buying a different ticket in between. So the NFC cards (and here they have several providers as well) are very convenient, since all the network operators support all the cards. Also nicely, all the drinks machines I've encountered in Japan also support these cards. As well as all the arcade venues with their claw machines.

One of the problems with a lot of RFID systems (or even generally non-token systems) that you need to get from a machine is that now, rather than sliding a couple dollar bills under a glass and getting a token in return, now you have confused tourists, often tired from travel, fumbling with unfamiliar machines with lousy UIs.

You see it too at busy tourist areas of a city.

In my experience, pretty much no one streamlines the experience of buying transportation tickets for people who aren't familiar with the system and may not speak the language.

I think it depends on location. In Paris, a machine usually is quicker, especially for non-French-speaking people.

Tellers mostly don't speak English and sometimes the intercom system barely works so even a French-speaking person will have a hard time communicating.

On the machine, a ticket to / from the airport is one of the first choices available, after language selection.

Of course, if your final destination isn't inside Paris proper, you may have harder time and may need to consult a map since fares aren't fixed.

I don't remember Paris as being a particular offender and I've taken the Metro around Paris quite a bit. Probably doesn't hurt that I can at least read French a bit. (I would characterize my French as putrid but I was there with a friend who doesn't know it at all and it does make a difference in general.)

I don't think language is the issue, but many of the machines have terrible UI design even if you select English or your native language.

In SF you have to insert your Clipper card TWICE, and listen to 9600 baud modem beep-booping in-between, and many stations don't even have recharge machines, and you have to go Walgreens (WTF) to get a transit card.

In China international credit cards aren't even accepted by the machines. In general tourists and business travellers are stuck dealing with cash while locals use mobile payments, which require a local SIM card and local bank account to use. (Now visitors can legally get these with just their passport, after which they can enjoy all the benefits of the Chinese internet ecosystem, but it's time consuming getting in line for them, it's almost impossible for people who don't speak the local language, and not all bank tellers actually know how to input a passport number instead of a national ID number into their system.)

I imagine similar things happen with other countries that implement their own payment systems -- tourists get left out.

Most of them have terrible UX for tourists.

It really makes me so sad. My dad is too stubborn to use an app when he travels to my city, so he'd be just as likely to just take a cab instead of public transport, paying 10x extra because their ticket system is unwelcoming to visitors.

I kind of miss the arbitrage that used to come when the price of subway tokens would go up. People would inevitably go in and buy hundreds of dollars in tokens and then hoard them for years. You can in theory do the same thing with “forever” stamps from USPS.

I don't (as a rule) fly, so I certainly haven't visited as many far away cities as you. However, don't you find that increasingly contactless payment just works anyway?

Certainly all Oyster terminals have accepted my Android phone for some time

[If you use it constantly I believe the cheapest options still involve paying up front for an Oyster - but visiting once a week for work, or a few days on holiday the system tracks where you went, then works out after the fact what the cheapest way to do what you did would have been, and charges any contactless payment system accordingly]

> However, don't you find that increasingly contactless payment just works anyway?

Aside from the (bigger) reason that they aren’t accepted in all stations yet, one reason I haven’t switched in NYC is I’m nervous about my phone running out of battery.

Yes this. It's much more reliable to just put the RFID card inside my phone case. I can continue to swipe into transit "with my phone" even if the battery is dead.

Also I always have to disable NFC on my phone because I have 2 phones and if they have NFC enabled they're always trying to talk to each other in my pocket and vibrating my crotch all day from it. Really bad UX.

The iOS wallet implementation allows access to certain cards long after the phone is “dead” https://support.apple.com/guide/security/express-cards-with-...

Another pro of RFID is that phones can theoretically work. They just enabled iPhone support for Clipper here in the Bay Area.

Is it using RFID or did they have to install NFC payment terminals at the turnstiles? My understanding (I haven't used it) is that for New York's OMNY system, they installed NFC hardware that Apple Pay knows not to ask for authentication with. (So that the Express Card functionality will work). But perhaps I am mistaken.

They're RFID readers, you can set any card as "Express Pay" in Apple Pay and it doesn't require auth. I have my Ventra Card in Chicago as my "Express transit" card and it will still work even when the phone is off or dead.

Can you actually exit the system without scanning the card again?

It depends on the system.

Most Asian metro systems charge a fine-grained per-distance fare, so they require scanning on exit.

Boston (and NYC I think?) is per-ride except for a couple stations that charge a surcharge to exit, so exiting doesn't require scanning except at those couple of stations.

Boston eliminated the last of its subway exit fares years ago. (The system is famous for the song Charlie on the MTA, about a man trapped on the train due to an increase in the exit fare.)

There are a couple of bus routes that require payment on exit. However, it's not a variable fare. It just works that way because the configuration at Harvard station requires entry on the left side side (without the farebox) and exiting curbside. So people pay as they leave, instead of when they board.