The state-run Metropolitan Transportation Authority has a new acronym: OMNY. Friday, the MTA introduced its “One Metro New York” fare technology on much of the 4-5-6 line and Staten Island buses.

The $645 million OMNY program, which requires you only to tap your phone or credit card against a pad on the turnstile or bus, is the MetroCard’s gradual replacement. If the MTA does it right — a big if — OMNY will be just as much of a revolution as the MetroCard 25 years ago.

In the mid-1990s, the MetroCard was a key aspect in reviving Gotham. Yes, the state had already invested $21 billion (in today’s dollars) in new taxes to rebuild trains and buses that had fallen apart by the 1970s. Subway ridership was up: It went from 952 million people in 1980 to 1 billion by 1994, a five percent increase.

After that, though, ridership exploded, to 1.4 billion by 2000, or 40 percent.

The city’s population — residents, tourists, and commuters — was growing. MetroCard enabled this growth by allowing for ­unlimited-ride monthly and weekly passes, plus bonuses for multiple rides, something old tokens couldn’t do.

For five-day-a-week commuters, the unlimited-ride passes — now used by more than half of passengers — made “extra” trips free. As subways got safer and busier, the volume discounts kept people from congesting the streets. That is, until it all got too crowded four years ago, and the temptation of artificially cheap Uber and Lyft rides, highly subsidized by global investors, tempted people into cars.

OMNY can be part of the MTA’s turnaround — which, in turn, is key to keeping New York growing; there is no room for more cars. In the next two years, the MTA will extend the technology to monthly and weekly passes, and start selling an OMNY card for people who don’t have credit or debit cards or who don’t want to use them. (Right now, only pay-per-ride customers can use it.)

OMNY can make paying the fare easier and faster on subways (after people get used to it). Friday morning at Grand Central, more than 30 people were in line to buy or refill MetroCards at vending machines. Just a few hours later, some of them could have tapped in, making life easier for them and for other people in line who don’t own later model phones or credit cards.

The biggest benefit will be on buses. Take a clogged bus down Fifth Avenue, and you are slowed at every stop by tourists who have a long conversation with the bus driver about how they need 11 quarters.

Since most people don’t carry eleven quarters, they shrug and board anyway, whole families in tow. Tap payment — familiar to European and Asian tourists — will reduce delays and fare thefts.

It can also make boarding faster: In Paris and London, passengers can move far into the bus, getting on at any door, before tapping against several fare-payment points inside the bus.

To fix congestion, faster buses are critical. Bus ridership has plummeted by 20 percent since 2008. Buses move at just 7 mph, barely faster than walking speed.

Swifter boarding will help ­especially combined with the MTA’s new congestion-pricing powers in Manhattan. Under new law, the MTA could create and enforce new bus lanes, something the city has been slow at.

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Better — and more frequent — buses that are easy to pay for can lure people from cars. It’s a lucky time to be rolling this out: Uber and Lyft, now publicly traded companies, are under pressure to raise their prices and show investors that they can turn multi-billion-dollar annual losses into profits.

Another place where OMNY could be revolutionary? Fare ­enforcement.

With tweaks to the planned system, NYPD officers could ask subway and bus riders for proof of paying during trips by asking them to tap a phone or a card against a hand-held machine or show a digital credit-card receipt, instead of just at the fare gates.

Proof-of-payment fare enforcement, rather just catching people randomly at turnstiles, makes it easier to identify people who are using subways and buses not to go anywhere, but as inadequate permanent shelters, bringing them to above-ground drop-in centers if they wish.

Like everything the MTA does, this process is too slow, with the MetroCard lingering until 2023. But within three years, OMNY will be, well, omnipresent — and the MTA can use it to improve other aspects of the transit system, or not.

Nicole Gelinas is a contributing editor of the Manhattan Institute’s City Journal.

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