Tropicana Field going cashless

[TheFugitive]

Tropicana Field in St. Petersburg, Florida, the home stadium of the Tampa Bay Rays,
has announced that for the upcoming season they are going to be the first stadium
to go all-cashless.

http://www.espn.com/mlb/story/_/id/25855304/tampa-bay-rays-tropicana-field-going-cash-free-2019

This means that if you want a beer, a hot dog or a ballcap at the game your only payment
options are going to be a gift card, a credit card, or a wireless payment system like ApplePay.
Cash will not be accepted.

Ostensibly the reason is to speed-up the transaction time.  What are the odds that this will
become a trend for retail in general?

[shore72]

Cashless gas pumps, cashless toll roads, at work I visit a couple large chains of auto repair shops that won't accept cash & have watched some older folks walked out with a dejected look. I never thought I'd embrace it myself but considering it can be a hassle to get to the bank, I rarely carry much on me. I can see this trend being a major inconvenience to folks without bank accounts or credit cards.

[BillyGr]

Being it suggests a gift card, would that mean they would have a place that would sell those (and take cash for them)?

That would make sense - limiting the number of locations that deal in cash and also not holding up a line ordering items since you'd then have a card.

One local small auto track around here does the opposite way - they only do cash (ATM's are available), at least for food items.
They also have a window where you go first to break any larger bills into $1's, so when you pay for the item(s), they don't have to deal with change (or only quarters, as some items might be $1.50 or similar).  I think they just stuff the $1's into a container, and someone else sorts/counts it later on, so getting (for instance) a drink takes only seconds.