Oh No! Freedom-Loving 'Murcans Lured Into Tentacles Of Socialist Mass Transit By High Gas Prices!
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Daily ridership on New York City subways increased 3% from March 1 to March 8, a gain of 101,595 trips. On Washington, D.C.s Metrorail, ridership rose roughly 4% between the same dates, while trips on San Francisco Bay Areas BART system climbed 7%. Thats a huge jump, considering weve just now come out of the omicron slump, said Alicia Trost, BARTs chief communications officer.
It is still too early to say how much of those gains can be attributed to fuel costs or any other single factor, Trost and other agency leaders stressed. Demand for transit across the U.S. is still just 62% of what it was pre-pandemic, according to a data dashboard by the American Public Transit Association. But trains and buses have been slowly but steadily refilling in 2021 and 2022; as the omicron surge subsides, white-collar workers are now streaming back to the office.
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In the Bay Area, which also boasts some of the nations costliest gas, a boost in riders would be especially welcome. The regions tech employers have been slow to ask workers to come back to the office, and San Francisco has the nations lowest office occupancy rate. BART ridership is just 30% of what it was before the pandemic; its board of directors recently discussed crisis mode strategies to make up for lost passengers.
We see this moment as absolutely critical to getting people to try our system even one day a week, said Trost of BART. She pointed to safety and sanitation improvements the agency has made since the start of Covid-19, alongside less crowding. Were really trying to communicate what riding our system is like now, because its nothing like what it was before the pandemic.
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https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-03-10/as-gas-prices-climb-so-does-transit-ridership?srnd=citylab-transportation