While the Utah Transit Authority is offering free fare on its buses and trains Thursday and Friday, Utah lawmakers advanced a bill that may add 17 such free-fare days scattered over the next three years to see how much it might reduce pollution.
Unlike the free fare days this week — which appear to be happening on relatively clean air days — the future ones would be triggered in a $1.2 million pilot program on days that are expected to be especially dirty just before or during inversions.
“This is a carrot. This is not a stick” to give drivers a financial incentive to use mass transit during bad air days — and then measure what kind of effect it has, said Rep.