Transit/walk/bike commute modal shares for selected Metros/Cities - 2011

[Eightball]

Plus, the system has to marinate some. There is active TOD construction and other plans to increase ridership.

[Crawford]

Originally Posted by electricron

Never-the-less, there's more transit ridership today than ever. The idea that the introduction of light rail trains has reduced bus ridership is true, but total ridership (both rail and bus) has risen.

I think I've read, on Streetsblog no less, an article indicating that total ridership in Dallas-Fort Worth has actually dropped since the introduction of light rail. I'll try and find it. It was for the whole Metroplex, not the City of Dallas or Dallas County.

And even the posted figures, if true, show a significant drop in transit share, since the region grew so much over the last 20 years.

So even assuming the posted figures showing growth, you have a metro area that built (or is currently building) something like 100 miles of mostly grade-separated light rail, along with pretty decent commuter rail, and transit share actually dropped, by a lot.

I think that alone is something of a cautionary tale. You can have a massive, game-changing investment, and yet transit share, already pitiful, actually decreases. Granted, it's possible that with no rail investment, the transit share would have dropped even further, but this type of performance certainly gives credence to anti light-rail types. You have cities like Calgary with 300,000 on 30 miles of track, and a U.S. metro of 8 million and three times the system can barely manage a third of the ridership.

[Crawford]

Here on Streetsblog-
Total transit ridership in the city actually fell between 2000 and 2010, despite billions in new investment in light rail.

http://streetsblog.net/2010/12/06/in-dallas-sprawling-city-form-hampers-shift-to-light-rail/

So it wasn't compared to back in the 80's, before light rail. It's looking from when the system was in its infancy to the present system. Total transit ridership fell, even though the region grew by 30%, and nearly the entire light rail system was yet to be built.

[LMich]

Why exactly are you belaboring the point, again? I'm confused; do you think Dallas shouldn't have even tried, that issues with ridership are fixable?

[Crawford]

Originally Posted by LMich

Why exactly are you belaboring the point, again? I'm confused; do you think Dallas shouldn't have even tried, that issues with ridership are fixable?

No, it provides a counterpoint to the Portland example.

It shows a massive investment resulted in decreased ridership, or, at a minimum, decreased market share.

I think, if you're not totally biased on one extreme or the other (militantly anti transit or pro light rail), it would lead you to consider alternatives. Look to Houston, for example. They're quite similar in spatial makeup, demographics, and attitudes towards transit, yet their market share grew, and they have far higher ridership, despite almost total reliance on buses.

So, for example, could Dallas have achieved the same results simply by investing in improved bus service? Or was ridership doomed to plummet without a massive light rail system? I think these are reasonable questions. These are valuable for cities considering light rail (such as Detroit) where advocates claim that people won't ride buses, but will ride light rail.

[J. Will]

Originally Posted by Crawford

I think that alone is something of a cautionary tale. You can have a massive, game-changing investment, and yet transit share, already pitiful, actually decreases. Granted, it's possible that with no rail investment, the transit share would have dropped even further, but this type of performance certainly gives credence to anti light-rail types. You have cities like Calgary with 300,000 on 30 miles of track, and a U.S. metro of 8 million and three times the system can barely manage a third of the ridership.

Calgary also has extremely expensive downtown parking rates, limited downtown parking spaces, and no freeways in the downtown area. It's pretty much the opposite of Dallas, which has tonnes of cheap parking downtown, and a downtown that is literally encircled in freeways.

[Doady]

DART service area population was 1.8M in 1996 and 2.4M today, meaning 33% growth since 1996. Their ridership only grew by 25% since 1986. You do the math.

I think the stagnant bus ridership of cities like Dallas, Portland, St. Louis, etc. it highlights a major problem with a lot of LRTs: they are built merely to replace buses. LRTs are built because of an elitist anti-bus mentality. Unfortunately, that's what's going right now Toronto too. I don't think you can increase overall transit ridership that kind of attitude.

[Eightball]

Its far to early to declare the system a failure. For example, when the DC metro system opened it averaged 100k riders a day. Now (several decades later) its over seven times that at 750k linked trips. I will say that Houston (with its very high ridership per mile numbers) showed that building where there is already high ridership potential makes more sense. Really, its crazy that both Dallas and Houston didn't build proper heavy rail systems, since they have high population numbers and are fairly dense.

[fflint]

DART average weekday ridership, according to APTA:

Fourth Quarter 1996

Light rail: 14,800
Total: 166,400

4th Quarter 2000

Light rail: 38,100
Total: 210,200

4th Quarter 2012

Light rail: 103,100
Total: 245,600

Looks to me like the rail system is a success.

Anyway, remember that we're talking about commute trips here--workforce participation has as much an effect on these statistics as the effectiveness of the public transit system in question. Workforce participation rates are at historic lows right now. Fewer people working means fewer people taking the bus or train to work.

[fflint]

For comparison's sake, here are the average weekday ridership stats for Portland TriMet:

Fourth Quarter 1996

Light rail: 29,900
Total: 228,800

4th Quarter 2000

Light rail: 71,100
Total: 281,100

4th Quarter 2012

Light rail: 115,400
Total: 316,000

[downtownpdx]

Originally Posted by Doady

I think the stagnant bus ridership of cities like Dallas, Portland, St. Louis, etc. it highlights a major problem with a lot of LRTs: they are built merely to replace buses. LRTs are built because of an elitist anti-bus mentality.

Besides just replacing bus lines, light rail in Portland has been used to act as a tool for high-density development, especially in the western suburbs like Hillsboro. It acts as sort of a selling point for developers and potential residents to take part in that type of mixed-use lifestyle in a way that bus lines cannot. I think there's also a permanency and reliablility factor that can make taking a train more appealing to people who otherwise wouldn't use mass transit.

[Doady]

Portland, OR

Weekday transit ridership, 1996 = 228.8k
Weekday transit ridership, 2012 = 316.0k
Transit ridership growth, 1996-2012 = 38.11%

Estimated population, 1996 = 1,754k
Estimated population, 2012 = 2,290k
Population growth, 1996-2012 = 30.56%

In other words, Portland's population growth was 80% of its transit ridership growth. To attribute all of Portland's 38% ridership growth over the past 16 years to the sheer power of Light Rail Transit is extremely misleading.

Originally Posted by downtownpdx

Besides just replacing bus lines, light rail in Portland has been used to act as a tool for high-density development, especially in the western suburbs like Hillsboro. It acts as sort of a selling point for developers and potential residents to take part in that type of mixed-use lifestyle in a way that bus lines cannot. I think there's also a permanency and reliablility factor that can make taking a train more appealing to people who otherwise wouldn't use mass transit.

Don't get me wrong. I think Portland is doing a good thing and I think LRT can be a good thing. I just don't like it when people exaggerate Portland's success or the virtues of LRT. Portland being top 10 in USA in terms of transit ridership is impressive, especially considering its size. But it seems like there still needs to be a lot of improvement.

[pdxtex]

i think the real elephant in the portland transit room is the east side extension of the streetcar. its still pretty new so its still catching on, but its ridership is pretty low right now. that will probably change as the inner SE industrial neighborhood starts to become more residential which i think is inevitable. look at the pearl 15 years ago, it was pretty sleepy. look at it now and its a mini vancouver.

[Munchitup]

Originally Posted by Doady

DART service area population was 1.8M in 1996 and 2.4M today, meaning 33% growth since 1996. Their ridership only grew by 25% since 1986. You do the math.

I think the stagnant bus ridership of cities like Dallas, Portland, St. Louis, etc. it highlights a major problem with a lot of LRTs: they are built merely to replace buses. LRTs are built because of an elitist anti-bus mentality. Unfortunately, that's what's going right now Toronto too. I don't think you can increase overall transit ridership that kind of attitude.

It seems to be working in Los Angeles, where we have seen an increase in bus ridership and rail ridership. Los Angeles does have the advantage of being much more densely populated than Dallas and Portland (and most other cities with LRT-based systems).

[pdxtex]

Originally Posted by Munchitup

It seems to be working in Los Angeles, where we have seen an increase in bus ridership and rail ridership. Los Angeles does have the advantage of being much more densely populated than Dallas and Portland (and most other cities with LRT-based systems).

ive never been to L.A. but just from hanging around this board, im inclined to believe that transit usage there is high and its got a good network. i think the nationwide perception is everybody drives, but i bet you could get by just using the bus and train. am i naive?

[electricron]

Originally Posted by fflint

DART average weekday ridership, according to APTA:

Fourth Quarter 1996

Light rail: 14,800
Total: 166,400

4th Quarter 2000

Light rail: 38,100
Total: 210,200

4th Quarter 2012

Light rail: 103,100
Total: 245,600

Looks to me like the rail system is a success.

I would agree. Using your APTA data and the population data listed by someone else between 1996 and 2012.........

2.4 Million / 1.8 Million x 100 = 133.3%
245.6 Thousand / 166.4 Thousand x 100 = 147.5%

Looks like total DART ridership has increased at a higher rate than DART service area population after all.

I would also like to report that for years DART's "manual" methodology for collecting ridership data on the light rail trains often under reported ridership by up to 25% over the years than the "automatic" counting machines used very recently. Many of the gloom and doom reports on DART ridership weren't as bad as many thought.

Both bus and light rail fares have risen in recent years, and I will admit these fare increases has stunted DART's ridership growth somewhat.
DART charges $2.50 for a 2 hour local fare, $5.00 for an all day local fare, $5.00 for a regional 2 hour fare, and $10 for an all day regional fare.
TriMet charges the same as DART local fares, TriMet doesn't have the equivalent of regional fares in place. So, for some DART customers, they're paying twice what all TriMet passengers are paying.

[ByeByeBaby]

Originally Posted by pdxtex

ive never been to L.A. but just from hanging around this board, im inclined to believe that transit usage there is high and its got a good network. i think the nationwide perception is everybody drives, but i bet you could get by just using the bus and train. am i naive?

LA's transit system has a lot more merit than people give it credit for. But the truth is that the attitude in LA is that transit is for poor people, and LA has a lot of poor people taking transit and driving the numbers up. Here are (using the 2006-2010 ACS PUMS data) the transit share for four metros with 6%-6.5% overall transit shares, for full time year-round workers, broken down by three levels of worker wage (under $30K, $30-50K, and $50K+: this is roughly thirds).


The metro areas with the highest transit use (NYC/SF/Chi/DC/Bos/Phi/Sea) all have fairly even distributions of transit use similar to Pittsburgh; generally speaking, very low transit use areas have highly uneven distributions of transit use like New Orleans (below).

And here is the same chart for five metros with around 2.5% overall transit share.


Despite the fact that LA's transit mode share is more than double Sacramento's, workers in the top third of income are equally likely to take transit.

[zilfondel]

Originally Posted by Doady

I think the stagnant bus ridership of cities like Dallas, Portland, St. Louis, etc. it highlights a major problem with a lot of LRTs: they are built merely to replace buses. LRTs are built because of an elitist anti-bus mentality.

Light rail was built in Portland for two main reasons: real estate TOD development, and cost efficiency of operations.

Light rail simply costs far less to operate per passenger than does bus service. The city was likewise able to leverage massive federal investments to alter downtown Portland and give it a huge facelift. Which worked, and worked well.

However, it is true that Trimet has cut back bus service - as well as light rail service. Many of the lines cut, however, were infrequent suburban routes that were lightly used.

On the flip side, when metro areas expand in area, many of the newer areas are not well serviced by transit. Similarly, a light rail system with 3 or 4 lines will not serve the entire metro area - walksheds for stations are generally only viable up to about a half mile, so a metro area really needs a dozen or so lines to really offer full coverage of the entire city and metro area. The more sprawled out the metro, the more lines you have to build - which is the real kicker for younger, western cities in the US.

[mhays]

But they failed to build TOD in large volumes. I'm wandering around rail lines on google maps and seeing lots of parking but not much density.

[Munchitup]

Originally Posted by ByeByeBaby

LA's transit system has a lot more merit than people give it credit for. But the truth is that the attitude in LA is that transit is for poor people, and LA has a lot of poor people taking transit and driving the numbers up. Here are (using the 2006-2010 ACS PUMS data) the transit share for four metros with 6%-6.5% overall transit shares, for full time year-round workers, broken down by three levels of worker wage (under $30K, $30-50K, and $50K+: this is roughly thirds).

The metro areas with the highest transit use (NYC/SF/Chi/DC/Bos/Phi/Sea) all have fairly even distributions of transit use similar to Pittsburgh; generally speaking, very low transit use areas have highly uneven distributions of transit use like New Orleans (below).

And here is the same chart for five metros with around 2.5% overall transit share.

Despite the fact that LA's transit mode share is more than double Sacramento's, workers in the top third of income are equally likely to take transit.

Interesting. I do think as the rail system expands, you will see these numbers even out a bit more. I have lived here going on three years now, and have seen attitudes change in that short time span. Another thing is that Los Angeles has a large number of low-income residents, so it may always look like a city in which PT caters to the poor. I would imagine the amount of low-income in Los Angeles vs. Sacramento and Pittsburgh is a much higher percentage, though I could definitely be wrong about that (Okay I realized that has nothing to do with the data in the chart .)

To answer the other poster's question, Los Angeles is a city in which you can get by with transit alone, though it may cost you some time vs. driving, and there will be some locations that are difficult to reach via transit (though very few locations that are impossible to reach).