Ridership of light rail, buses rose 7% in 2005

02/14/2006

Metro Transit cites gas prices, weather

BY CHARLES LASZEWSKI
Pioneer Press

Dramatically higher fuel prices and a mild winter trumped fare increases and bus service cuts as more people jumped on Metro Transit’s buses and light-rail trains in 2005 than the year before.

Metro Transit officials told a Metropolitan Council committee Monday that the number of rides jumped 4.7 million in 2005 to just under 70 million — a 7.2 percent increase. What’s more, last month continued the trend, with Twin Cities residents taking a half-million more rides than they did the previous January, a nearly 10 percent increase.

“We have a very favorable story to tell,’’ said Julie Johanson, assistant general manager for Metro Transit. “When the fuel prices were spiking … it helped our ridership. The mild winter brought a few people out to ride the bus and the rail.’’

The Hiawatha Light Rail line was the percentage increase superstar, going from an average of 19,245 weekday riders in December 2004 to 25,629 last December, or a 33 percent gain, according to Metro Transit’s figures.

But the old system workhorse, the bus, caught on after a slow start. From August through December, with only one exception, average weekday ridership outpaced the previous year. In December, there were 196,084 weekday rides on average, compared with 189,203 in 2004.

Johanson said persuading more people to leave their cars at home and ride the rail and the bus is one of Metro Transit’s top goals for 2006. Bruce Howard, director of marketing, said the agency will be working with employers, doing more direct mail and media advertising, all in an effort to entice people to try the bus and light rail. A survey of metro-area residents found “a large portion are willing to look at alternatives’’ to the car, Howard said.

Still, last year’s numbers only boost the agency’s ridership to where it was in 1999, before light rail existed. And it’s a long way from the 1979 peak annual ridership of 93.7 million.