Following on from Monday's newsletter, the article in the url below presents the results of some data analysis that I found surprising:
"Sometime around 2013, bus ridership across much of the country began to decline. It dropped in Washington, in Chicago, in Los Angeles, in Miami. It dropped in large cities and smaller ones. It dropped in places that cut service, and in some that invested in it. It dropped in Sun Belt cities where transit has always struggled to compete with the car, and it dropped in older Eastern cities with a long history of transit use. By late 2019, through nearly seven straight years of decline, national bus ridership in America was at its lowest level since the mid-1970s, a trend that has left service already weakened as transit agencies brace for a public health crisis."
A graphic in the article reveals the extent of the decline in specific cities:
As always, attempting to work out what caused such a decline is challenging:
"The answer probably lies deep in a number of trends: the rise of on-demand technology, the changing nature of work, the evolution of e-commerce, the redevelopment of city centers, the influx of young professionals, and the suburbanization of the poor. Many seismic shifts in urban life are reflected in this one data point — the broad decline of bus ridership. … That's worrisome both for the remaining riders and for cities that will need strong mass transit to meet their climate goals."
One variable that needs to be controlled for is overall traffic – commuting traffic, in particular. The article suggests that, throughout the period under study, the economy was strengthening, which means there should have been more workers with more jobs requiring them to commute. But, if commuting traffic was declining at a faster rate than public transportation (perhaps, as younger workers move downtown instead of living in the suburbs) then, relatively, public transportation is capturing a higher percentage of the commuting population, even though overall numbers are declining. If commuting traffic has been flat or increasing, however, that is a more worrying situation:
"In Minneapolis, bus ridership began declining in 2014 and has fallen by 26 percent. Some bus trips appear to have shifted to a newly opened light rail line. But Uber and Lyft have expanded in the city over this same time. Bike commuting has increased. The transit agency has also detected an uptick in car ownership in neighborhoods historically well served by buses. And in a strong economy, Metro Transit struggled to replace a generation of retiring bus operators, hampering service. Workers have simply had more options, as agencies around the country have found."
One shift over this period that was not accounted for in the analysis is the influence of ride-hailing apps, like Uber or Lyft. As I have noted previously, many suspect that part of the business model of these companies is to slowly under-price public transportation (or over-convenience passengers) and, then, after all the buses have been removed from our streets, they will be able to increase prices and riders will have no other choice (see Strategic CSR – Uber):
"Studies have been less conclusive on the effect of ride-hailing companies, in part because their user data hasn't been accessible to researchers. But preliminary findings from a continuing project through the Transportation Research Board show that the largest declines in transit ridership at the metro level can be attributed to the introduction of ride-hailing services. And in the largest cities, ride-hailing has affected buses more than rail."
In spite of this, I found these results surprising because my idiosyncratic perception is that public transport is increasing. But, I live in the middle of a city, and the fact that the numbers are down across most metro areas in the U.S. is compelling (and concerning). And, if we end up working more at home after this pandemic, we should expect these declines to increase.
Take care
David
David Chandler
© Sage Publications, 2020
Instructor Teaching and Student Study Site: https://study.sagepub.com/chandler5e
Strategic CSR Simulation: http://www.strategiccsrsim.com/
The library of CSR Newsletters are archived at: https://strategiccsr-sage.blogspot.com/
The Mystery of the Missing Bus Rider
By Emily Badger and Quoctrung Bui
March 13, 2020
The New York Times
