mtbascannerSince we have our smartphones with us all the time, more tasks in our daily lives are starting to make the switch to digital. In fact with apps like Passbook, Apple is attempting to reduce the need for physical coupons and tickets, and at the same time consolidating all your privilege cards into a single app.

Well the good news for New Yorkers is that sometime in the future, you can look forward to paper-free train tickets, thanks to a partnership between the Metropolitan Transit Authority (MTA) Board and Masabi. Both the MTA and Masabi conducted a trial back in 2012 which presumably went well, which might explain this recent development.

According to the MTA, this program is expected to roll out to the Metro-North Railroad and Long Island Railroad first, before it makes its way to other routes, but even then there’s no telling when those two routes will get it. Ben Whitaker, Masabi’s CEO, told Digits that because the MTA system is so massive, it will take a fair amount of time to implement everything.

However once everything is up and running, commuters will be able to buy their tickets and present them to train conductors via their phones, thus cutting down on the need for paper tickets. New York isn’t the first place in the US to implement such a system. Masabi has introduced similar systems in other parts of the US, like in Boston back in 2012.

Filed in Transportation..

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