Transit Ridership Surges Again on Second Spare the Air Day

Double-Digit Increases Continue at Many Transit Agencies

OAKLAND, CA — Transit ridership climbed above normal levels again on Aug. 30, the second Spare the Air day of 2007. Thousands of additional passengers returned to ride transit free all day on Bay Area buses and light rail, and until 1 p.m. on BART, Caltrain, the ACE train and Bay Area ferries. In total, 29 transit agencies are participating in the “Free Transit/Spare the Air” campaign which is sponsored by the Metropolitan Transportation Commission (MTC) and the Bay Area Air Quality Management District (Air District). The goals of the program are to increase awareness of the link between transportation choices and air quality, build transit ridership regionwide, prevent exceedances of the national 8-hour ozone standard and encourage longer-term behavior changes that benefit air quality. There were no exceedances of the federal eight-hour ozone standard on either Aug. 29 or 30, the two Spare the Air days thus far in the 2007 summer smog season.

Bus and Light Rail Ridership for Aug. 30

MUNI recorded a ridership jump of 41 percent yesterday, with 100,450 additional passengers on 14 key MUNI routes. These routes carried 344,553 passengers on Aug. 30 compared to the baseline number of 244,103. AC Transit held steady on Aug. 30 with an increase of 27 percent on key routes (288,732 riders on Aug. 30 compared to the baseline of 226,732 riders). Other bus systems reporting double-digit increases in ridership included:

Sonoma County Transit with 1,493 additional passengers, a 26 percent increase (7,141 passengers on Aug. 30 compared to 5,648 on the baseline day);
Santa Rosa CityBus with 1,005 additional passengers, a 10 percent increase (10,917 passengers on Aug. 30 compared to 9,912 on the baseline day);
Tri-Delta Transit with 3,326 additional passengers, a 41 percent increase (11,437 passengers on Aug. 30 compared to 8,111 on the baseline day);
The Western Contra Costa Transit Authority (WestCAT) with 1,067 additional passengers, a 20 percent increase (6,526 passengers on Aug. 30 compared to 5,459 on the baseline day);
Healdsburg Transit with 10 additional passengers, a 20 percent increase (61 riders on Aug. 30 compared to 51 on the baseline day);
The Benicia Breeze with 197 additional passengers, a 31 percent increase (826 passengers on Aug. 30 compared to 629 on the baseline day); and
The Vacaville Coach with 292 additional passengers, a 36 percent increase (1,098 passengers on Aug. 30 compared to 806 on the baseline day).

The Dumbarton Express recorded a three percent drop in ridership on Aug. 30 with 846 passengers, compared to the baseline number of 873. Petaluma Transit registered a five percent decrease in ridership on Aug. 30 with 624 riders compared to the baseline number of 660.

Rail Ridership

A passenger increase was also recorded on BART, where the promotion ended at 1 p.m. BART reported 3,300 more riders than usual on Aug. 30, an increase of just over one percent over the baseline (355,700 passengers on Aug. 30 compared to the 352,400 baseline number).

Ferry Ridership

Golden Gate Ferry ridership continued its triple-digit gains on the Sausalito-to-San Francisco route. Ridership climbed by 189 percent with 1,823 passengers on Aug. 30, compared to 630 on the baseline day. On the Larkspur-to-San Francisco route, ridership increased by 27 percent, from 3,455 on Aug. 30, up from 2,713 riders on the baseline day. Other increases in ferry ridership included the Vallejo Baylink Ferry with 370 additional passengers, a 27 percent increase (1,742 passengers compared to 1,372 on the baseline day).

MTC has committed $7.5 million in federal air quality funding for this year’s program, with another $1 million contributed by the Air District. To receive email notification of Spare the Air days the day before, register for AirAlerts at www.sparetheair.org. To plan a trip on transit, to learn more about the program, or to view a list of all 29 participating Bay Area transit agencies, go to www.511.org.

MTC is the transportation planning, financing and coordinating agency for the nine-county San Francisco Bay Area.