$13.5 Million A Year

What are you going to do, make me pay? Why yes, yes they will:

Fare-evaders who brazenly board buses without paying would be targeted in a crackdown being developed by transit and police brass, officials said Tuesday.

Approximately 130,000 riders a week board buses without dipping MetroCards, or plunking change into fare boxes, according to new transit data, suggesting the cash-strapped agency is losing millions of dollars annually.

“We’ve identified the worst routes, including the worst bus stops or hot spots,” said Joseph Smith, NYC Transit vice president in charge of buses.

Smith said he hoped the crackdown would start in a week or two. An NYPD spokesman, however, said Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly has yet to sign off on a final plan. The two sides are in talks about how the Metropolitan Transportation Authority could defray costs.

Fare-beaters enter via rear bus doors that are opened by exiting passengers or by helpful riders on board. Some simply saunter past the driver and fare box up front. To reduce the risk of being assaulted, drivers are instructed not to confront or accost fare-beaters.

Above-ground fare-beating is most prevalent on 10 routes in Brooklyn and the Bronx, according to NYC Transit. The worst is the B46 in Brooklyn where drivers have reported “theft of service” at a rate of about 4,000 a week. The route runs the length of the borough, between Williamsburg and Marine Park, through Crown Heights, Bedford-Stuyvesant and East Flatbush and Flatlands.

Smith wouldn’t speculate on why some routes have rampant fare evasion while others have none. But the agency now has a better understanding of where evasion is taking place, officials said.