MEMORANDUM

Date:               February 26, 2014

To:                   David L. Corliss, City Manager

From:              Robert A. Nugent, Public Transit Administrator

Subject:           2013 Ridership Update

Fixed Route Ridership History

Note: For this report only ridership on routes and service that is funded by the City is being considered. As the system currently operates KU students, faculty and staff prepay their fares and can ride any bus route by presenting a KU ID. Anyone that is not a KU student can ride any route by paying a cash fare.

Ridership on fixed route service has increased every year since the passage of the Transit Tax Referendum in 2008. Beginning in 2009 staff began restructuring routes in order to take advantage of coordination and to correct issues with service. Service changes have taken place every subsequent year and have resulted in ridership increases that, for the first time, eclipsed one million passengers in 2013. As can be seen in the following graph total annual fixed route ridership has grown from 437,671 in 2008 to 1,063,128 in 2013 which amounts to 142% increase.

Fixed Route Monthly Ridership

Over the last year (2012-2013) ridership on fixed route service has increased 22%.  During that time there was only one month (August) that ridership did not increase over 2012. This was primarily due to the later start date for classes at the University of Kansas. The following graph also highlights monthly fixed route ridership in excess of 100,000 passengers for the first time in our history.

Historically, monthly fixed route ridership has increased steadily since 2008. As can be seen in the following graph, when comparing like months (ex. September 2009 to 2010) ridership has increased for each succeeding year since 2008.

T Lift Ridership History

Ridership on T Lift has been fairly consistent since 2008. From 2001 to 2007 ridership grew at a steady pace. Due to the high operating cost of T Lift efforts were made to change the certification process which resulted in a decline in ridership. From 2008 until 2013 ridership has been fairly consistent.

NightLine Ridership

In June 2013 Lawrence Transit began operating a service known as NightLine. This service was planned to operate for one year as a pilot service. As can be seen from the following graph, the ridership grew steadily from June through October. Ridership since October has fallen but is typical of lower ridership on all service during both November and December.

Fare and Pass Revenue