The City of Philadelphia offers free travel benefits to its employees

The City of Philadelphia has invested $9m in the SEPTA Key Advantage programme rolled out by Southeastern Pennsylvania Transit Authority (SEPTA) and transportation technology company, Jawnt. Now all 22,000 city staff including full-time, part-time, and provisional employees are eligible for a SEPTA Key card giving them free access to all SEPTA transit modes including bus, subway, and regional rail. 

SEPTA carried out six-month pilot phase of its Key Advantage programme in the first half of 2022 where it worked closely with  Penn Medicine, Drexel University, and WaWa. These companies each purchased six-month all-access passes for all their eligible employees. In July of the same year, SEPTA began working with Jawnt to deliver technology solutions that could be used to expand the programme to additional employers.

The programme was officially launched in March this year and has attracted nearly 2 dozen employers with the City of Philadelphia being the largest in the region to sign up. Announcing its participation, Mayor Jim Kenny described it as “an opportunity to boost the City’s hiring and retention efforts, and support our goals of sustainability, traffic safety, and equity as well.”