Pittsburgh’s Port Authority of Allegheny County and the University of Pittsburgh (Pitt) have reached an agreement that will provide prepaid transit access for approximately 40,000 university students, faculty, and staff for the next five years.

“Our collaboration with the University of Pittsburgh as the first large-scale smart card partner has been incredibly valuable and we are extremely pleased to continue this partnership,” said Steve Bland, chief executive officer of the Port Authority.

The agreement provides for annual reimbursements by the university based on recorded usage by its students, staff, and faculty. Pitt’s annual payment to the public transit agency has increased by more than 50 percent over the past five years and is projected to continue generating additional revenue under this agreement.

Under the new agreement, reimbursements will be based on a per-ride formula rather than the previous flat payments based on historical/projected ridership numbers. What makes this change possible is the university’s implementation of smart card technology in its IDs, which allows for a more accurate ridership count and helps curb fraudulent use of IDs by former students or staff.

For each recorded ride, the university will reimburse Port Authority at 50 percent of the one-zone base fare, which currently is $2.50 per ride. The reimbursement rate would change automatically with any future one-zone base fare increase but with a maximum cap. The agreement is retroactive to July 1, 2012, and expires June 30, 2017.

Port Authority’s U-Pass program also provides public transit service to students and other personnel at Carnegie-Mellon University and Chatham University. Ridership from the three institutions is about 600,000 trips per month, or about 11 percent of the agency’s total ridership.