MR Stephen J. Williams (South China Morning Post, April 15), gave his comments on the recently announced MTR fare increases to take effect from May 1. As Mr Williams rightly pointed out, the $50 common stored value ticket was replaced by a $70 one last October, at which time we undertook that when we considered our new fare proposals for 1994, we would take this change into account. When we formulated our 1994 overall fare increases, we did allow for the effect of this ticket replacement and this fact has been made known at Legco meetings which were open to the public. The 7.1 per cent reflects the estimated average fare increase effective from May 1, 1994 and even after allowing for the $50 ticket replacement, the increase is still slightly lower than inflation. The $50 student stored value ticket is an addition to the existing $30 ticket in order to provide our student passengers with a choice of tickets of a higher denomination. MIRANDA LEUNG Corporate Relations Manager Mass Transit Railway Corporation