A subway and bus fare hike and increases in tolls charged on bridges and tunnels are among the options that the Metropolitan Transportation Authority is considering to close a projected budget gap.

The MTA’s announcement of those measures this morning could be another blow to Governor Spitzer, who controls a majority of the MTA board and who is already reeling this week from an attorney general’s report criticizing his top aides for politicizing the state police by using them against a political foe. Subway and bus fare hikes have cost politicians in opinion polls in the past, and they are often instituted at the beginning of a governor’s term when re-election is far on the horizon.

The MTA could look to bring in up to an additional $500 million a year by raising subway, bus, and commuter-train fares, as well as tolls. The money would help narrow operating deficits that are projected to grow to $1.8 billion by 2010, officials briefed on the preliminary five-year financial plan said. That could translate into raising the $2 base fare, raising the price of discounted monthly and weekly MetroCards, or both. Subway and bus fares could jump to $3 if tolls and state subsidies are not also raised by 20%, according to a report issued last month by the city’s Independent Budget Office.

Some city officials and transit advocates say raising the price of a subway ride could be particularly brutal on commuting New Yorkers when the city is also moving forward with a congestion pricing plan in Manhattan that would raise prices on drivers.

MTA officials said the earliest they would see any revenue from congestion pricing, which would charge drivers to enter most of Manhattan during peak hours, would be 2010.

“We don’t have the revenues from congestion pricing yet,” the CEO and executive director of the Partnership for New York City, a business group, Kathryn Wylde, said. “To the extent that the MTA anticipates deficits in meeting the operating needs, they can’t rely on the uncertain prospect of congestion pricing revenues to fill them.”

The MTA has been able to stave off a fare hike for years, largely because of the booming real estate market, which has channeled revenues to the agency through property taxes.

“I think it will be different this year,” the chief attorney of the Straphangers Campaign, Gene Russianoff, said. “The surplus will not be enough to stave off a fare hike.”

The base subway fare has not been raised since 2003, when it jumped to $2 from $1.50. 30-day passes jumped to $70 from $63 in 2003 and then up to $76 in 2005.

Even with a fare hike that brought in half a billion additional dollars to pay for new subway cars, buses, and station maintenance, the MTA would still have to rely on state aid to get its finances under control, sources briefed on the budget said. “There are only three ways for the MTA to get the money: the city, the state, or the riders,” the executive director of the Permanent Citizens Advisory Committee to the MTA, William Henderson, said. “If the riders are going to be paying additional money, there should be additional money coming from other MTA funding partners as well.”

The MTA is reportedly expected to call for more revenue from state taxes.

The MTA in the past has favored a policy of instituting modest fare hikes every few years rather than infrequent whopping increases. Some city officials said they were not convinced any fare hike is necessary.

“First we need to know what’s being done with unspent funds from previous capital plans and mismanaged technology, such as the automated L train,” the chairman of the City Council’s transportation committee, John Liu, said. Mr. Liu attacked the MTA last year for having $212 million of unspent funds from its previous capital plan in its coffers while stations sat in disrepair. Mr. Liu said that the delayed “robotrain” experiment on the L line had also cost the agency hundreds of millions of dollars.

No service cuts are planned for 2008, according to officials who were briefed on the plan.

The MTA board is expected to pass a resolution that would allow hearings on a fare hike. The MTA is scheduled to submit an updated financial plan in November, and the agency would adopt the budget in December.

Yesterday evening, the MTA held a press briefing about the fare hike for reporters from selected newspapers, but declined to admit a New York Sun reporter when the newspaper declined to abide by specific rules about what it would publish in this news article.