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  #81  
Old Posted Dec 13, 2019, 8:39 PM
mhays mhays is online now
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Originally Posted by Crawford View Post
I don't see any reference to changes in counting methods. Where do you get that?

APTA does appear to have some sloppy recordkeeping. Their Canadian numbers show wild quarterly swings, and you occasionally see weird outlier numbers. But the NY and DC numbers match what's reported by the transit agencies.
The Denver media reported on it.

All of these numbers are self-reported by local agencies, with varying methods and levels of accuracy. For example you can count train passengers with sensors at train doors, or by turnstile, etc.
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  #82  
Old Posted Dec 13, 2019, 8:54 PM
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Originally Posted by Crawford View Post
Yeah, I've only looked at Toronto. If you look at their past quarterly numbers, there are wild quarterly swings that cannot be explained by naturally occurring events. Like how does the subway double or halve its ridership in a quarter? Short of a zombie invasion that isn't happening.
For a period of time the lower linked ridership numbers were mistakingly being reported instead of the significantly higher number of unlinked trips.
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  #83  
Old Posted Dec 14, 2019, 4:15 PM
Crawford Crawford is offline
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Originally Posted by mhays View Post
All of these numbers are self-reported by local agencies, with varying methods and levels of accuracy. For example you can count train passengers with sensors at train doors, or by turnstile, etc.
Well, yeah. No one claimed that official agency reporting is some infallible message from God.

But there's nothing better, obviously. Agencies obviously have an interest in accurate reporting, as it drives their mission. Agencies are regularly audited. APTA is supposed to be standardizing these numbers.
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  #84  
Old Posted Dec 15, 2019, 7:20 PM
ssiguy ssiguy is offline
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For the Toronto GO commuter numbers they screwed up.............they forgot to add a zero. The number is not 25.8k but rather 258k. It's a typo.
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  #85  
Old Posted Mar 31, 2020, 8:51 PM
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APTA 4Q numbers are out. Still mostly negative trends in U.S. Bus numbers seem to be somewhat stabilizing. NY/NJ and LA had flat bus ridership, which is an improvement.

Overall rail numbers may be positive, though, but only because of NY subway. DC Metro also did well.

https://www.apta.com/wp-content/uplo...rship-APTA.pdf
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  #86  
Old Posted Apr 1, 2020, 7:50 AM
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Kinda too bad they corrected the Toronto heavy rail numbers to unlinked trips. Makes it kind of hard to compare before and after the subway extension. The massive growth of the light rail numbers seems weird too, maybe another correction or a new mistake.

Note the massive increase in bus ridership and slight decline rail ridership for Dallas after they expanded bus service. Detroit bus numbers falling, and apparently their QLine is losing riders as well. Maybe more obsession with rail will only continue to hold US transit back. Seattle had 120 million riders when it finally built rail. Las Vegas has close to 70 million and still no rail. Maybe those places should be the model for the rest of the US rather than places like Dallas, Charlotte, St. Louis.

Even Washington's heavy rail system gets much fewer riders than you might expect. It is 30% larger than the heavy rail systems of Toronto and Montreal combined, and yet it gets only 1/4 of the riders. Why? Maybe the answer lies in the difference in the size of the bus systems: 1600 buses carrying 105 million annually in the Washington area compared to 4200 buses carrying over 500 million riders in the Toronto area. Washington also has fewer bus riders and fewer buses than Boston, Philadelphia, San Francisco, Seattle. A heavy rail network that is well-developed but exists too much in isolation cannot realize its full potential.
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  #87  
Old Posted Apr 1, 2020, 12:50 PM
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DC's Metro, in the U.S. context, is extremely successful. Second highest ridership of any heavy rail system, and the entire region's development patterns are now centered on Metro routes. U.S. cities generally aren't gonna have similar ridership as Canadian or other foreign cities for numerous obvious reasons.
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  #88  
Old Posted Apr 8, 2020, 2:20 AM
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The Washington rail goes far out to the fringes. It seems more akin to BART, more emphasis on the suburbs. That might explain the low ridership relative to the size of the network. The ridership per km is lower than the other heavy rail systems Boston, Chicago, Los Angeles, Philadelphia too. If it is designed for different purpose, then maybe not really fair to compare to those other systems, let alone Toronto and Montreal.

Maybe that is the problem. Maybe there is not enough service for local, crosstown or non-work trips. You can see Washington has 72% higher weekday ridership than Boston but only 56% higher annual ridership. Transit mode share for commutes was about the same as San Francisco in 2010 (over 15%) but overall ridership per capita was lower, at the Boston level (89/capita).

Ridership of WMATA has also suffered a major 19% drop last ten years, more than most of the other systems. Despite the ridership loss of BART, San Francisco metro area has seen growth, but to complement BART it has much more comprehensive local transit network than Washington does, to serve more diverse travel patterns.

NYC Subway, PATH (418km): 6755.0k boardings/km
Boston Subway (61km): 2,497.4k
Los Angeles Metrorail (28km): 1,492.0k
Philadelphia SEPTA (59km): 1432.4k
Chicago L (165km): 1320.8k
Washington Metro (188km): 1264.4k
Atlanta MARTA (77km) 831.1k
San Francisco BART (167km): 739.6k

New York City Transit, Metro-North, LIRR: +11.8% change, 2009-2019
San Francisco Muni, BART: +0.3%
Boston MBTA: -5.5%
Philadelphia SEPTA: -8.2%
Chicago CTA, Metra, Pace: -11.5%
Washington WMATA: -18.8%
Los Angeles MTA, Long Beach, Foothill Transit: -21.1%
Atlanta MARTA: -24.4%
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  #89  
Old Posted Apr 8, 2020, 3:27 PM
Crawford Crawford is offline
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Originally Posted by Doady View Post
The Washington rail goes far out to the fringes. It seems more akin to BART, more emphasis on the suburbs. That might explain the low ridership relative to the size of the network. The ridership per km is lower than the other heavy rail systems Boston, Chicago, Los Angeles, Philadelphia too. If it is designed for different purpose, then maybe not really fair to compare to those other systems, let alone Toronto and Montreal.
Right. DC Metro is more like an S-Bahn or RER-type system. Its closest North American analogues would be BART, MARTA, and that crappy system in Miami, and DC trounces all those systems in terms of ridership.

DC was a relatively small metro until the 1950's. The system mostly serves a suburban, sprawly population, and is more commuter-oriented than day-to-day oriented. Not really reasonable to compare to traditional urban heavy rail systems. I think, in that context, DC Metro is quite successful.

Granted, it's also because there are a bajillion DC-area federal workers and contractors, all of who are heavily incentivized to take Metro. The region works hard to ensure that major federal job centers are located next to Metro stations.
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  #90  
Old Posted Apr 8, 2020, 10:48 PM
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I thought BART is interesting because it's an S-Bahn style system in North America, but Washington is even better. With more local and crosstown service, Washington would be a robust network, equal of San Francisco, if not even better.

Btw, the Toronto light rail numbers seem to be a correct. 504 King alone is 80k weekday boardings for example. If you look at previous years, system was around 300k total per weekday, 504 King was around 40k but with the new LRVs and the new transit priority measures along King the ridership skyrocketed.

Also it's sad seeing the way the governor of Wisconsin has destroyed Milwaukee's transit system. Milwaukee used to be the leader among US metropolitan areas from 1 million to 2 million. Even in just 10 years, ridership has fallen to almost half, down to the Charlotte level now. Even with a more supportive government it will be hard for the system to recover.
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  #91  
Old Posted Jun 30, 2020, 9:34 AM
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Q1 2020 APTA data is now out. Interestingly, it appears that US transit ridership was rebounding in the first two months until COVID shut things down.



https://www.apta.com/wp-content/uplo...rship-APTA.pdf
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  #92  
Old Posted Jul 2, 2020, 1:48 AM
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I think the long-term consequences will be far more grave in the US in term of transit ridership than it's contemporaries in Canada or Europe. Every transit system on the planet is suffering from a collapse in ridership, the US is certainly not unique in that regard. The difference is that the relatively few people who do take transit in the US do so strictly due to getting to and from work and nearly all of it headed downtown.

Relatively, far fewer Americans take transit outside of getting to work than other countries. In most US cities, transit is more akin to commuter systems than an actual 24/7 transportation option which is why American service is so incredibly poor in the suburbs, late night , and on weekends. The problem for the US is that these 9 to 5 office workers who do take transit are far more likely to be able to do it at home. US systems are going to lose much more of their "bread & butter" than in other countries where transit is something you use all the time and not just for commuting purposes.
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  #93  
Old Posted Jul 3, 2020, 3:40 PM
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It will be interesting to see what happens now that farebox revenue is in the shitter and municipal governments are broke. Who will fund transit operating costs until reidership rebounds to pre-COVID levels...
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  #94  
Old Posted Jul 4, 2020, 6:27 AM
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It will be interesting to see what happens now that farebox revenue is in the shitter and municipal governments are broke. Who will fund transit operating costs until reidership rebounds to pre-COVID levels...
it's not going to be the US DOT.
States, cities, and transit agencies will be expected to assume these costs.
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  #95  
Old Posted Jul 4, 2020, 5:01 PM
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USDOT will obviously have to rescue U.S. transit. But it won't likely happen till January next year, when the cancer in DC is removed.
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  #96  
Old Posted Jul 4, 2020, 5:28 PM
mhays mhays is online now
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The current transportation bill would be a shot in the arm, at least the house version.
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  #97  
Old Posted Jul 4, 2020, 11:23 PM
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While this crisis looks like a serious problem blow for transit, I think we are gonna need it more than ever soon.

How much ridership decline in the last decade was caused by gentrification and easy car loans and people having plenty of money? Probably a lot.

A recession is going to push people to spend less on transportation in the near future. In the long run, the tech bro invasion is over and as rents return back to earth, cities will revert to having a mix of income levels, some of whom will be frugal and ride the bus.
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