Travel on Canberra's public transport network will be free from September 20 as the switch over to a new ticketing system begins.
The free travel period is expected to last at least six weeks and cost $2.5 million in lost revenue. The free period will also mean the NXTBUS real-time information systems will be unavailable.
Several thousand old MyWay cards have been registered in the last few weeks, with the government pushing for travellers to register their details so they can easily transfer any outstanding balance to the new system.
Bus and light rail services will continue to operate to timetables, but passengers will not need to pay to travel during the transition period.
The MyWay+ system, once installed, will allow passengers to pay for travel using their debit and credit cards and provide more accurate information about travel times.
Transport Minister Chris Steel said significant process had been made to deploy the new ticketing system in the last few months.
"We are now at the exciting point where system installation can commence. This includes removing the existing MyWay equipment on board buses and installing the new MyWay+ validators both in buses and along the light rail alignment," Mr Steel said.
"System testing will also take place with over 200 Canberrans providing feedback on the new system and its journey planning functionality."
Mr Steel again urged MyWay card holders to register, a process he said took two minutes, and would make it easy to transfer the balance on the old card to the new system.
"We are about to enter a very exciting period for public transport in Canberra. MyWay+ will seamlessly integrate buses, light rail and real-time information to get you where you need to be. Powerful journey planning, live service updates and more ways to pay will put the power of public transport in your hands," he said.
The new card readers will accept dedicated MyWay+ cards, credit and debit card payments and will read quick response (QR) codes from cards, phone screens and paper tickets. Paper tickets will be available from ticket machines and will be available for sale online for printing at home.
Credit and debit card payments - to be processed by Westpac - will not attract a customer surcharge. Processing fees will be factored into the fare price.
Screens onboard buses will display upcoming stops and the the time to reach each stop along the route, while artificial intelligence will be used to generate spoken stop announcements.
Transport officials expect data collected by the new system will allow them to more accurately design timetables that respond to traffic congestion and patronage.
The ACT government signed a contract with NEC Australia in February 2023 to deliver the ticketing system upgrade, after an extended process to find a new provider that began in 2017.
MyWay was introduced on Canberra's bus network in April 2011, replacing a magnetic strip-reliant system first introduced in the 1990s. It was expanded to cover light rail when the route between Gungahlin and the city centre opened in April 2019.
