Transit ridership is slowly recovering

From the Sound Transit ridership dashboard

Last month, Metro reported an average weekday ridership exceeding 200,000 boardings. This is a mark that hasn't been seen since the pandemic started, with the exception of last October (which typically represents the peak month of ridership in a year). More encouraging is that year-over-year growth is currently sitting at about 40%, which certainly trends with the lifting of pandemic restrictions.

Sound Transit has also clawed back much of its lost ridership, sitting just shy of 100,000 daily boardings in April. Central Link ridership is back to a respectable 66,000 boardings, although it's unreasonable to make comparisons to pre-pandemic levels with the Northgate extension having opened just last Fall.

There's some discussion about the effect of high gas prices on ridership recovery. From a recent KOMO article:

If it gets up to like $7 a gallon I don't know what I'm gonna do," said Apollo Rising, Seattle driver. I'm probably gonna use the bus a lot more."
...
We hear it sometimes on social media that people are choosing transit because of the cost," said Sean Hawks, spokesman for King County Metro. It's $2.75 for a bus fare but even less expensive fare if you're a senior, youth or have a disability or have a lower income."

Many remember the summer of 2008, when drivers fleeing gas prices helped boost transit ridership to what were then record-levels. My suspicion is that we're not seeing exactly the same effect now largely since many workers are still working from home.

As I stated last month, crossing arbitrary thresholds can provide feel-good moments but they should not be the barometer we use to gauge system health in a post-pandemic world.