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a transaction

statico on 2005-10-13T13:46:17

Subway "T" tokens in Boston cost $1.25. It's still cheaper for me to buy tokens as I go than to buy a commuter pass since I only take the train around 4-6 times a week. Lately I've developed a habit of leaving purchased tokens at home, so when I went to purchase tokens yesterday with a ten-dollar bill, I figured that I'd only need four, not eight.

Here's what happened:

  1. I walked up to the booth next to the turnstiles and slipped my $10 bill under the glass. I said, "Four, please," with good articulation and volume to avoid confusion -- a touristy faux pas.
  2. The following mix of currency and tokens was pushed back toward me:
    • 4 brass T tokens
    • 2 Sacagawea golden dollar coins
    • 1 Susan B. Anthony dollar coin
    • 1 $2-dollar bill
    • 1 $1-dollar bill

For those of you not in America, the only part of the above that people typically trade is the $1 bill -- at least, where I live. Golden dollars are unpopular. The $2 bill? Hell, there's even urban legend about the service industry thinking that they're fake.

Because I was busy talking to a friend on the ride to school, I didn't fully understand what had happened until I got there. The only logical explanation is that the T attendee recognized my inner nerdiness via scent. He must have decided to test my automata knowledge by presenting a denomination whose correctness can only be calculated in polynomial time.

I figure the extra dollar makes up the the tens of dollars the stupid token machines have eaten over the years, anyway.

Dollar coins

dha on 2005-10-14T17:36:02

I don't know about anywhere else, but in nyc, the dollar coins (sacajewea or Susan B.) are an instant sign to everyone that you've just used a ticket machine at grand central or penn station. I'm wholly unsurprised that you have encountered them in a transit situation.

Re:Dollar coins

statico on 2005-10-14T18:04:41

The MBTA buses and trains used to claim that they wouldn't accept dollar bills. They never enforced this, except for the occasional and rare power-hungry driver/conductor.

At some point a long time ago I noticed that they added "Golden dollar accepted here" stickers to the coin collecters. I've seen one or two people drop a golden dollar in, but I don't pay that much attention.

The event described above is the _only_ time I've gotten something other than brass tokens and dollars back a human or machine MBTA token vendor.