ORCA transit smart cards will be available for free through Feb. 28.
Starting March 1, a standard adult or youth ORCA card will cost $5. The free-card promotion had been scheduled to end Jan. 31.
ORCA — for One Regional Card for All — is a collaboration between Metro Transit and transit systems in King, Kitsap, Snohomish and Pierce counties. The plastic card contains a microprocessor; cards come equipped with a so-called e-purse function to allow riders to preload fares onto the card. Customers can also purchase a pass product, like a monthly PugetPass, and then load it onto the smart card.
Buy a card online here or at a Sound Transit vending machine. Standard adult ORCA cards can be purchased from any ticket machine at Central Link light rail stations or Sounder commuter rail stations. Central Link is open seven days a week, so riders can pick up a card at the locations 24/7.
Order a card by phone at 888-988-6722 toll-free.
Or pick up a card at the Metro sales office on the mezzanine level of Westlake Tunnel Station and Metro headquarters in the King Street Center building, 201 S. Jackson St., Seattle. The office will be open Saturdays from Jan. 30 through the end of February.
Transit officials said the extended free-card promotion should help ease the transition to ORCA and reduce the rush for the cards at customer service centers. Each of the ORCA partner agencies took special measures, like increased staff at ticket locations, to meet the high demand.

Delhi Metro Tuesday unveiled “smart key chains”, a new smart card that is half the size of the present one and more friendly for thousands of commuters who wish to travel ticket-less.
“The sleek new ’smart key chains’ can be used in the same way as normal smart cards to enter and exit Metro stations, that is by swiping on the designated space on the automatic fare collection (AFC) gates,” Delhi Metro spokesperson Anuj Dayal said.
“The decision to introduce the smart key chains was taken as many Metro commuters use cars, two-wheelers or bicycles and normally use key chains which they can now replace with the new devices,” he added.
While the Metro smart cards are of the size of credit cards so that they can be kept in wallets, the smart key chains are much smaller so that they can easily be carried in pockets. The corners are rounded and the sides tapered so that they do not cause cuts while being taken out. They are made with high-quality plastic and are coated with acrylic resin to make them unbreakable.
Delhi Metro has procured 50,000 smart key chains in the first lot. About 1.5 million smart cards are presently in circulation. Among over 900,000 Metro commuters daily, 55 percent are smart card users while the rest use tokens.