Monday, February 2, 2009

Texas Ridership Down

The Houston Chronicle is reporting that ridership is down in Houston, Dallas, and Austin in the last three months. I don't understand why transit planners at these agencies are racking their brains wondering why transit ridership is down. I mean, the economy has nothing to do with it. Right?

And the reasons are not always readily apparent.

In one instance, DART officials were puzzled when ridership suddenly dried up in a Dallas neighborhood that had provided consistent business for years. It was determined that apartment closures were to blame.

I think we'll see more of this in the coming months.

3 comments:

Chris Bradford said...

When I drive in the morning, I see very light traffic.

Anonymous said...

Apparently, the Wendell Cox/Randall O'Toole crowd must be claiming that people don't want to use transit anymore. Liars! And now with the OC Transpo strike over (ended by emergency legislation approved by Parliament last week), the O-Train was back and running, and I used it yesterday. (Rides are free until February 13th!)

"The economy has nothing to do with it." This is the excuse these stupid hacks will be using.

Would have been better if the O-Train had been built instead of the Transitway BRT sham.

With the strike over, maybe guys here similar to the aforementioned Cox and O'Toole will claim that a possible decline in ridership from the strike (which, of course, was caused by lack of transit service, and not really reflecting peoples' preferences) supposedly shows that transit is "in decline". :)

Anonymous said...

Gas prices down?