R.I.P. MetroCard — You Tapped Out Before We Did

Who honestly thought the MetroCard would survive this long after its debut in the 1990s? It showed up right on time, when our pants pockets could no longer accommodate a respectable handful of subway tokens because—tragically—we needed room for Nokia phones the size of bricks.

The MetroCard was more than plastic. It was status. Sliding that blue-and-yellow slab out of your wallet made you feel like you were flashing an American Express. The democratization of wealth. A universal badge of belonging. Wall Street banker or starving artist—everyone swiped the same way.

But alas, progress waits for no one. The machines behind the MetroCard are reportedly powered by technology roughly contemporaneous with the Commodore 64. Replacement parts are so rare that even a 3D printer looks at them and says, “Yeah, no.”

Enter the 21st century—eventually—via OMNY. A modern system where you can tap your phone, your smartwatch, or a shiny new OMNY card that lets you cosplay nostalgia while still pretending nothing has changed. It all sounds wonderfully convenient: just visit an MTA booth, load money, and voilà—innovation.

Except… outrage! After years of OMNY advertising, helpful signage, announcements, ads, pilots, pilots of pilots, and more pilots, some New Yorkers now insist they weren’t given enough time to prepare. Truly astonishing. It has likely taken longer to complain about OMNY than it does to actually get an OMNY card.

Unless, of course, the real plan was to finish collecting every MetroCard design before extinction. A noble effort. Very ’90s. Much like reloadable phone cards—remember those? The Beanie Babies of telecommunications. Collect them, wait for appreciation, retire early. We all know how that went. Spoiler alert: not great.

So please, New York, let’s move on. Stop mourning. Start tapping. Use your phone. Use your card. Maybe even test out the new, allegedly fare-evasion-resistant turnstiles while you’re at it. Two birds, one tap.

A beautiful way to kick off the new year: the MTA claws its way out of financial despair, and you forget the MetroCard ever existed.

Happy New Year.
See you underground.