Posted on 03/09/2021 5:56:56 AM PST by Onthebrink
Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority’s (WMATA) Metrorail ridership has plummeted roughly 90 percent, with an average daily ridership of 77,000 people in 2021. While Metro ridership has slowly decreased over the last decade, it did jump in 2019 to 626,000 average daily riders before it experienced its largest decline in 2020 due to the pandemic, with only 177,000 average daily riders, according to Metro data. The lack of riders brewed significant drops in revenue. WMATA’s proposed budget for fiscal year 2022 notes it may have to close up to twenty-two stations next year and cut some bus routes if additional federal funding is not provided.
“Like the airlines, public transit systems have a massive investment in facilities and capital equipment as well as big payrolls, and the collapse in fare revenue has hurt them every bit as much as the drop in air traffic has hurt the airlines. One response is to cut service . . . but these steps reduce the attractiveness of transit, further compounding the falling ridership problem. As a result, like support for the airlines, federal support to tide transit systems over until ridership rebounds is crucial, and Biden's stimulus package contains such funds,” Jan Brueckner, an economics professor at the University of California Irvine, said.
(Excerpt) Read more at nationalinterest.org ...
If only government was forced to be fiscally responsible...
PORK ahoy!
90% decrease in ridership?
What about a stimulus package for the muggers? They must be hurting!
A good sized meteor could relieve the country of its biggest disease - Washington D.C.
Remove a considerable number of felons, slime molds and raise the nation’s IQ as a side benefit.
Eff them and the turds they rode in on.
90% decrease in ridership?
Probably due to the fed pork force staying home. UNKN, useless work from home program while garnering a massive check.
During the financial crisis of 08, one area of the country was virtually unscathed: DC vicinity.
Washington,DC is a government town. If even the government finds its workers can work from home and there is no absolute need to travel to a central location, imagine what is happening in most urban centers. In New York City ridership on all forms of mass transit has diminished greatly and the demand for central commercial locations has also decreased. You can blame COVID but its really the new technology that allows private sector productive work without a central location. There are no huge daytime crowds in Manhattan. If people don’t return retailers and resaurants will remain closed however virus free. Right now these Democratic cities are depending on Federal subsidies to maintain their power base. Despite the lower ridership and tax revenues there have been no layoffs. These generous subsidies to Democratic power bases can’t last forever and even at current levels can’t keep the nonsense going for long.
They’re not coming back. Everyone is used to virtual meetings being productive at home.
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