NY's MTA -- Fare & Toll Hikes in 2015 & 2017 Won't Be As Large

Some years ago, to crawl out of its budget hole, NY's MTA said, essentially, there would be fare and toll hikes in perpetuity. But on Wednesday, the authority said, well, at least the hikes for 2015 & 2017 will be about half of what we projected. 

At its monthly board meeting, the authority said "as a result of improved MTA cost cutting and increased tax and operational revenue, the MTA anticipates the previously announced 2015 and 2017 fare and toll increases would be designed to yield an increase of 4%. This amount is almost half of the 7.5% yields that had been previously projected."

In a press release, the authority noted that "risks remain."  Chief among them:  there's no labor deal.  The plan "assumes that labor agreements that are currently open will be settled with three years of net-zero wage growth."  That's a big assumption -- such a deal eluded two MTA chiefs, Jay Walder and Joe Lhota, both of whom were unable to close that deal.

There's also no word on what a 4 percent increase would translate to -- the 2013 hikes meant monthly metrocards rose from $104 to $112.