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Originally Posted by goat314
St. Louis actually has one of the more successful LRT systems for a metro it's size. It has higher rail ridership than similar sized cities Charlotte, Pittsburgh, Baltimore, Cleveland as recent as 2019.
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The point is, even though its rail ridership is higher than Pittsburgh and Baltimore, the overall ridership of St. Louis is much lower than Pittsburgh and Baltimore. Despite their low rail ridership, Pittsburgh and Baltimore are among the transit leaders in the US, St. Louis is not.
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Originally Posted by goat314
The low ridership per mile is more to do with it going through literally rural areas in the Metro East (Illinois) to get to Scott Air Force Base. The system has expanded several times since its inception in 1993. Ridership has gone down ever since service cuts happened during the 08 recession and have never recovered. There were also concerns over some high profile crimes that happened on and near the city.
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Ridership declined by almost half since 2008, that's crazy. I think you can see for yourself, the amount of service is more important than the amount of rail.
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Originally Posted by goat314
With all that said, you still haven't provided any evidence that someone riding busses is a prerequisite to train ridership.
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What high ridership rail system in the US or Canada is not complemented by a high ridership bus system? New York, San Francisco, DC, Portland, Toronto, Montreal, Calgary, they all have large bus networks and high bus ridership. A network is multiple lines interconnecting, not a few rail lines in isolation. What evidence is really needed for that?
You guys make baseless claims about an "anti-bus" culture, and I have already discussed examples which counter that: Seattle, Las Vegas, Pittsburgh, Baltimore.
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Also, many people that don't have to ride transit aka "choice riders" do prefer rail over busses. It's just a reality in many US metros. Also, St. Louis has higher bus ridership than light rail.
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Even if "choice riders" prefer rail over buses, chances are they will have to take buses to and from a rail station, unless they are lucky enough to both live and work next to a rail station.
If you look at the highest ridership systems, the common link between them is high bus ridership, not high rail ridership. You can also see Dallas' rail ridership actually declined in 2019 after a major increase in bus service. It's just hard to see the correlation between more rail and increased ridership.