Stop the SunRail/Lynx ticket scammers

We hate it when slick people abuse the system, especially when their cheating shortchanges SunRail and Lynx.

The scam we heard about works like this: A person arrives at a SunRail station by car. Then they walk over to a waiting Lynx bus and ask the driver for a transfer.

As you probably know, Lynx riders get a free transfer to ride SunRail.

Then this scammer uses the transfer to swipe on the ticket-vending machine for a free SunRail ticket.

To those ticket scammers, we have three words: Knock it off!

Those scammers are cheating SunRail, Lynx and all the other riders who paid their hard-earned money to ride SunRail and Lynx.

Stolen pennies add up to dollars and dollars add up to thousands of dollars. Public transportation in Central Florida is woefully underfunded. They can’t afford the hit.

To the well-meaning bus drivers, we respectfully ask you not to give transfers to people who didn’t ride your bus.

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Why do SunRail stations only have 1 cash machine?

Here is another one of those questions we get all the time from fellow riders. How come there is only a ticket machine on one SunRail platform that takes cash. 

We know one woman – a first time rider – who only had cash when she came to the station and didn’t realize the cash machine was on the other platform. So we put the question to a SunRail spokesman. Here’s his response:

“There is only one cash machine at every station due to the additional maintenance and costs associated with operating a cash machine (i.e. people try to jam bills into the receptacle, it requires an armored service to empty the machines, and a place to store and count the cash, etc.). More and more CRT properties (including Tri-Rail) are moving toward this system of fare collection. If there are more stations northbound, the cash machine is on the NB platform. If there are more stations SB, the cash machine is located on the SB platform. Rationale is, you are more likely to serve the most passengers where additional destinations are on the line.”