May 2015 Sound Transit Ridership Report

May saw healthy weekday Link growth of 6.6% and total system growth of 5.7%. Weekday ridership was up across the board, with only Paratransit seeing a decrease. Due to weekend tunnel closure for U-Link work, Link's weekend service took a hit. Link's 12 month moving average was 33,939 in May. That is a hair's breadth away from the 34k originally forecast for 2011. At that point ridership growth was supposed to level off. As the chart to the right shows, ridership is still growing at a strong clip. It's becoming increasingly apparent that Link's initial ridership lag was due to the Great Recession and continued gains will wipe out that early shortfall.

May's Link Weekday/Saturday/Sunday average boardings were 35,878 / 24,958 / 20,746, growth of 6.6%, -10.9%, and .1% respectively over May 2015. Sounder's weekday boardings were up 11.6% with ridership increasing on both lines. Tacoma Link's weekday ridership increased 4.5%. Weekday ST Express ridership was up 4.2%. System wide weekday boardings were up 5.7%, and all boardings were up 3.2%. The complete May Ridership Summary is here.

My charts below the fold.