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Post by Gokhan on Jul 19, 2012 7:45:03 GMT -8
A lot of the ridership has to do with inertia -- people's fear of not driving, which is what they consider as the only way of life, no matter how inconvenient or expensive it can be. Talking to my neighbor who works at LA Live, he told me that he cannot take the Expo Line because he will have to walk from 7th/Metro. When I told him that the Pico/Flower Station is only a block, he said he doesn't want to lose his parking pass, for which he pays perhaps $200 a month, which is good even during special events. I told him he can take the line to the special events, too. Then he said that he occasionally has to carry a box to work. The other strange thing is that, in more than two months, he didn't even bother to try it once. Yet, he complains about the rush-hour congestion on the freeway. Imagine how many people are there just like him -- the overwhelming majority of the population! I think once the inertia is gradually overcome, the Expo Line is going to see huge ridership. If the Expo Line beats the Blue Line when Phase 2 opens, I wouldn't be surprised at all. Even with Phase 1, we can see ridership in excess of 50,000.
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Post by masonite on Jul 19, 2012 9:24:03 GMT -8
A lot of the ridership has to do with inertia -- people's fear of not driving, which is what they consider as the only way of life, no matter how inconvenient or expensive it can be. Talking to my neighbor who works at LA Live, he told me that he cannot take the Expo Line because he will have to walk from 7th/Metro. When I told him that the Pico/Flower Station is only a block, he said he doesn't want to lose his parking pass, for which he pays perhaps $200 a month, which is good even during special events. I told him he can take the line to the special events, too. Then he said that he occasionally has to carry a box to work. The other strange thing is that, in more than two months, he didn't even bother to try it once. Yet, he complains about the rush-hour congestion on the freeway. Imagine how many people are there just like him -- the overwhelming majority of the population! I think once the inertia is gradually overcome, the Expo Line is going to see huge ridership. If the Expo Line beats the Blue Line when Phase 2 opens, I wouldn't be surprised at all. Even with Phase 1, we can see ridership in excess of 50,000. Some people won't take it no matter how convenient, which I find annoying since rail transit has never been convenient for me in my 16 years in LA. The main thing that may get him to try it out is if other people at work start using it. I worked for a federal Govt. agency as an intern downtown in 1995 and it was looked down upon if anyone drove alone. Carpooling and public transit were the norm even then.
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Post by Gokhan on Jul 19, 2012 9:42:44 GMT -8
The main thing that may get him to try it out is if other people at work start using it. I worked for a federal Govt. agency as an intern downtown in 1995 and it was looked down upon if anyone drove alone. Carpooling and public transit were the norm even then. Actually his girlfriend, who also happens to be his coworker and lives in Long Beach, picks him up every morning and drops him off in the evening; so, he's actually carpooling. I suggested to him that instead of carpooling all the way, they can drive to Venice and Robertson (which is only 1.3-miles-away and I can walk there in 21 minutes, faster than taking the Big Blue Bus) and take the Expo Line from there. Apparently the girlfriend has taken the Blue Line on occasions and is familiar with the Metro Rail system somewhat.
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Post by matthewb on Jul 20, 2012 8:29:40 GMT -8
The main thing that may get him to try it out is if other people at work start using it. I worked for a federal Govt. agency as an intern downtown in 1995 and it was looked down upon if anyone drove alone. Carpooling and public transit were the norm even then. Actually his girlfriend, who also happens to be his coworker and lives in Long Beach, picks him up every morning and drops him off in the evening; so, he's actually carpooling. I suggested to him that instead of carpooling all the way, they can drive to Venice and Robertson (which is only 1.3-miles-away and I can walk there in 21 minutes, faster than taking the Big Blue Bus) and take the Expo Line from there. Apparently the girlfriend has taken the Blue Line on occasions and is familiar with the Metro Rail system somewhat. Not to get too sidetracked, but if the girlfriend is coming from Long Beach, and your friend is coming from somewhere around Culver City, and they're both working near Pico Station, why doesn't he take the Expo Line and she take the Blue Line?
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Post by Gokhan on Jul 20, 2012 10:42:08 GMT -8
Actually his girlfriend, who also happens to be his coworker and lives in Long Beach, picks him up every morning and drops him off in the evening; so, he's actually carpooling. I suggested to him that instead of carpooling all the way, they can drive to Venice and Robertson (which is only 1.3-miles-away and I can walk there in 21 minutes, faster than taking the Big Blue Bus) and take the Expo Line from there. Apparently the girlfriend has taken the Blue Line on occasions and is familiar with the Metro Rail system somewhat. Not to get too sidetracked, but if the girlfriend is coming from Long Beach, and your friend is coming from somewhere around Culver City, and they're both working near Pico Station, why doesn't he take the Expo Line and she take the Blue Line? If she was by herself, she would probably take the Blue Line but she likes spending as much time with him as possible. You know how these things go.
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Post by tonyw79sfv on Aug 5, 2012 15:22:38 GMT -8
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Post by masonite on Aug 5, 2012 15:32:27 GMT -8
There already was a roger waters concert back in May.
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Post by joshuanickel on Aug 5, 2012 19:31:44 GMT -8
The problem is that on their website for transportation options, it does not list the Expo Line as a option. We need to open LA's eyes to the fact that Metro is headed west to these major destinations:
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Post by Gokhan on Aug 6, 2012 18:32:59 GMT -8
We'll see what the July ridership will be for Expo. I also found out that the current ridership of the 20/720 bus is 60,000.
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Post by bluelineshawn on Aug 6, 2012 19:06:41 GMT -8
If you recall, Bruce Shelburne specifically mentioned that this would be Metro's first attempt at event service on Expo. 6-minute headways I would imagine.
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Post by bluelineshawn on Aug 6, 2012 19:09:49 GMT -8
The problem is that on their website for transportation options, it does not list the Expo Line as a option. We need to open LA's eyes to the fact that Metro is headed west to these major destinations: Wow!! What terrible directions!
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Post by bluelineshawn on Aug 6, 2012 19:19:15 GMT -8
We'll see what the July ridership will be for Expo. I also found out that the current ridership of the 20/720 bus is 60,000. I've been checking almost every day. I'm expecting a significant jump based on what I've seen.
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Post by wad on Aug 7, 2012 2:22:12 GMT -8
I also found out that the current ridership of the 20/720 bus is 60,000. Wilshire has always been L.A.'s busiest route. There was "BRT" on Wilshire before 720 came along. There were five Wilshire buses before June 2000: 20, 21, 22, 320 and 322. In 2000, 320 (and 318 on Whittier) became 720. Line 22 and 322 were canceled when San Vicente Boulevard service was turned over to Santa Monica. Line 21, which ended at UCLA, was canceled in 2002 or 2003. Bus ridership on Wilshire may be lower now because the subway has taken some of it between downtown L.A. and Western.
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Post by Elson on Aug 7, 2012 2:25:41 GMT -8
The problem is that on their website for transportation options, it does not list the Expo Line as a option. We need to open LA's eyes to the fact that Metro is headed west to these major destinations: My big pet peeve with a lot of websites that mention "Public Transportation" information is that they usually have a link to www.metro.net and nothing else. It's like they're going, "Wanna take transit to our place? Fine! You go figure it out! Bahahaha!" Meanwhile, the auto directions are highly detailed by freeway, exit and turns. I had friends who attended the opening weekend festivities at the new Grand Park in DTLA. They were seriously considering parking at the Culver City station and taking Metro in, but were sort of confused as to how far the subway stop was to the park entrance, so they ended up driving instead. I told them, "Well...next time, get out at the north end of the Civic Center station, cross the street AND YOU'RE THERE!" Even in cities with more established transit systems (NY, SF, London, etc), people still need a little hand-holding in terms of transit directions.
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Post by Gokhan on Aug 7, 2012 9:18:45 GMT -8
I also found out that the current ridership of the 20/720 bus is 60,000. Wilshire has always been L.A.'s busiest route. There was "BRT" on Wilshire before 720 came along. There were five Wilshire buses before June 2000: 20, 21, 22, 320 and 322. In 2000, 320 (and 318 on Whittier) became 720. Line 22 and 322 were canceled when San Vicente Boulevard service was turned over to Santa Monica. Line 21, which ended at UCLA, was canceled in 2002 or 2003. Bus ridership on Wilshire may be lower now because the subway has taken some of it between downtown L.A. and Western. I wonder if Phase 1 will be able to beat the 20/720 bus before Phase 2 opens. Expo Line will probably have more than 100,000 daily ridership once Phase 2 opens but that's not for another three years. They will probably have to reduce the headways to 5 minutes then. Let's see if the current ridership was able to exceed 25,000 in July.
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Post by LAofAnaheim on Aug 7, 2012 9:41:08 GMT -8
Wilshire has always been L.A.'s busiest route. There was "BRT" on Wilshire before 720 came along. There were five Wilshire buses before June 2000: 20, 21, 22, 320 and 322. In 2000, 320 (and 318 on Whittier) became 720. Line 22 and 322 were canceled when San Vicente Boulevard service was turned over to Santa Monica. Line 21, which ended at UCLA, was canceled in 2002 or 2003. Bus ridership on Wilshire may be lower now because the subway has taken some of it between downtown L.A. and Western. I wonder if Phase 1 will be able to beat the 20/720 bus before Phase 2 opens. Expo Line will probably have more than 100,000 daily ridership once Phase 2 opens but that's not for another three years. They will probably have to reduce the headways to 5 minutes then. Let's see if the current ridership was able to exceed 25,000 in July. The 720 Rapid is very unique, there is no bus line in North America that connects that many prime destinations on a single line. Downtown LA, Koreatown, Mid-Wilshire, LACMA, Beverly Hills, Westwood, VA, West LA and Santa Monica. Expo Phase I cannot rival the destinations that 720 Rapid has. Plus, during rush hour, 720 has headways of 2 - 5 minutes. Even if Expo Phase I is faster commute, the convenience, density and sheer destinations along the 720 are much better than Expo. There are still more reasons and convenience to 720 than Expo Line.
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Post by masonite on Aug 7, 2012 10:38:24 GMT -8
Wilshire has always been L.A.'s busiest route. There was "BRT" on Wilshire before 720 came along. There were five Wilshire buses before June 2000: 20, 21, 22, 320 and 322. In 2000, 320 (and 318 on Whittier) became 720. Line 22 and 322 were canceled when San Vicente Boulevard service was turned over to Santa Monica. Line 21, which ended at UCLA, was canceled in 2002 or 2003. Bus ridership on Wilshire may be lower now because the subway has taken some of it between downtown L.A. and Western. I wonder if Phase 1 will be able to beat the 20/720 bus before Phase 2 opens. Expo Line will probably have more than 100,000 daily ridership once Phase 2 opens but that's not for another three years. They will probably have to reduce the headways to 5 minutes then. Let's see if the current ridership was able to exceed 25,000 in July. Sorry, no way Expo Phase I beats 60k. Also, the 20/720 ridership will go up even more once the Wilshire Busway opens up, which will happen before Expo Phase II. I think everyone is waiting for the July ridership figures to see what Expo did in its real first month. I am guessing 22k, but that is purely an uneducated guess since I don't ride during the week. If we hit 22k, then I don't see 27k after one year being a problem. Just think once the kinks are worked out with the signaling and we have slightly better times and more consistent operations. Expo will be a success by any measure. Phase II should be a rousing success from the get go.
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Post by bluelineshawn on Aug 7, 2012 12:04:05 GMT -8
Sorry, no way Expo Phase I beats 60k. I would have agreed just a couple of weeks ago. I still think that you're more than likely correct, but I'm not positive anymore. In order to get to 60k that would be 8k per mile. That's almost what the red line does. I don't think that can happen with 12-min headways, but if they somehow get more cars and can run 6 minutes, they just might. Expo has some advantages over the other lines. USC is in the middle of phase 1 and expo has heavy ridership both ways. Its also a huge on weekends and will have lots of special events nearby to boost ridership. But given operational and equipment constraints, I think that it will likely top out at around 5k-6k per mile, which is an amazing 45k total.
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Post by bzcat on Aug 8, 2012 9:30:43 GMT -8
I've noticed there is a lot of "reverse pattern" commute on Expo (i.e. west bound to Culver City in the morning, east bound to Downtown LA in the evening) so I think the ridership is going to escalate quickly towards 30k when USC starts new academic year at the end of August. I would not be surprised if we go over 35k in October after UCLA is back in session as well. And I believe we will be talking about the line hitting 40k riders by next summer.
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Post by bluelineshawn on Aug 11, 2012 14:00:08 GMT -8
I've noticed there is a lot of "reverse pattern" commute on Expo (i.e. west bound to Culver City in the morning, east bound to Downtown LA in the evening)... That's actually supposed to be the peak pattern when the line is fully built to Santa Monica. IIRC Metro even predicted that would be the peak pattern for Phase 1 only, although I'm too lazy to look it up in the FEIR.
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Post by rubbertoe on Aug 15, 2012 11:14:55 GMT -8
July is 18,181. I will update the charts later today...
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Post by Gokhan on Aug 15, 2012 11:21:57 GMT -8
Ridership numbers have been posted for the month of July. Expo ridership is still pretty low at 18k; so, Culver City hasn't helped much.
My recent observations have been that the ridership on Expo has been dropping or fairly constant at best. This morning the train was almost empty, although to be fair, the train before left only 7 minutes before us.
I think they need better bus connections and need to give more signal priority between Expo/Vermont and Pico/Flower to speed up that section, which is always two - three minutes (sometimes five minutes) behind schedule. Vermont - Culver City section usually makes up for two minutes.
Breakdowns are also discouraging passengers. Some first-time riders were laughing yesterday when we were going 10 MPH between Culver City and La Cienega due to signaling issues and they thought the entire trip would be 10 MPH. It took us six minutes to get to La Cienega. I told them that this was unusual and they were glad to hear that.
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Post by masonite on Aug 15, 2012 12:58:23 GMT -8
Ridership numbers have been posted for the month of July. Expo ridership is still pretty low at 18k; so, Culver City hasn't helped much.My recent observations have been that the ridership on Expo has been dropping or fairly constant at best. This morning the train was almost empty, although to be fair, the train before left only 7 minutes before us. I think they need better bus connections and need to give more signal priority between Expo/Vermont and Pico/Flower to speed up that section, which is always two - three minutes (sometimes five minutes) behind schedule. Vermont - Culver City section usually makes up for two minutes. Breakdowns are also discouraging passengers. Some first-time riders were laughing yesterday when we were going 10 MPH between Culver City and La Cienega due to signaling issues and they thought the entire trip would be 10 MPH. It took us six minutes to get to La Cienega. I told them that this was unusual and they were glad to hear that. Pretty disappointing as I thought we would get to at least 20k this month with Culver City and the reports of the trains being pretty packed (although I still hear reports of the trains being empty too every once in a while). Might be tough to hit 27k after one year, but I think we'll be close enough.
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Post by Gokhan on Aug 15, 2012 13:12:32 GMT -8
It almost looks like the ridership has been dropping for the last few weeks. I wonder if some people who are trying the line are going back to driving. Considering that the Culver City added about a couple of thousand new riders, the ridership is not much higher than when the line first opened.
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Post by bobdavis on Aug 15, 2012 14:21:05 GMT -8
Let's wait until the men and women of Troy return to classes--that should light up the passenger loading scoreboard! (My older daughter is a USC alumna, class of 1983. Even the daughter of a railfan probably would have had a hard time believing that the bumpy old ex-PE track south of campus would be transformed into a 21st Century electric railway)
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Post by ieko on Aug 15, 2012 17:15:01 GMT -8
It almost looks like the ridership has been dropping for the last few weeks. I wonder if some people who are trying the line are going back to driving. Considering that the Culver City added about a couple of thousand new riders, the ridership is not much higher than when the line first opened. There seems to be lots of hyper focused attention on this lines ridership... Relax. The line is doing fine, no need to worry!
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Post by macross287 on Aug 15, 2012 18:22:36 GMT -8
I agree with ieko
Considering that Expo is currently an 8.7 mile line those 18,181 boarding translates to roughly 2,090 boardings per mile which is on par with the Gold Line (2,334 boardings per mile) and the Green Line (2,361 boardings per mile) and this is only its 3rd month of operations and first full month to culver city.
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Post by carter on Aug 15, 2012 21:28:44 GMT -8
Pretty disappointing as I thought we would get to at least 20k this month with Culver City and the reports of the trains being pretty packed (although I still hear reports of the trains being empty too every once in a while). Might be tough to hit 27k after one year, but I think we'll be close enough. For what it's worth, the 27K ridership number was the expected level for ridership on the Phase 1 segment in 2020. There's plenty of time to get there. Frankly, I think 18K is pretty good given the early service quirks, lack of USC in session and the 12 minute headways. Source: t.co/y8ePP01x (pdf)
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Post by jamesinclair on Aug 16, 2012 0:12:57 GMT -8
July is 18,181. I will update the charts later today... The only reason some of you see this as low is because of the posters making personal observations and guessing 20,000+. Folks, we're looking at an increase of almost 7,000 in just two months. Thats phenomenal. Remember, the "experts" over at the Reason foundation stated that transit ridership does NOT rise with time. With THAT expectation, this number blows away everything. For those folks who are worried, take a look at the gold line ridership charts and notice how month after month after month ridership continues to increase. Transit adoption is slow. Many people dont just modify their commute on a dime. Take USC for example, the true ridership effect will take 4+ years. Why? A 2011 freshman may have arrived on campus with a new car, as transit options were poor. As thats a sunk cost, they will keep that car for the rest of their USC career. A 2012 freshman may not arrive with a car because theyre aware of the new expo line. They may remain carless for 3 years. .....or to over simpligy it to a ridiculous extreme..... 2012-2013 year we can say that 25% (the freshmen) of campus is "ready" for expo (assuming the entire 75% of returning students have cars....I did say over simplify!) 2013-2014 year 50% are expo ready, freshmen and sophmore 2014-2015 75% are expo ready. Those who bought cars are about to graduate. 2015-2016 are 100% expo ready. By that point, USC students know they dont need a car. Yes, many will continue to own one, but the point is, it took 4 years for the student body to turn over entirely. And thats just USC. There are millions of commuters who wont give up their car because leaving it parked seems like a waste of money. Nobody wants a $15,000 paper weight. Its human nature to want make use of something even if it means digging a deeper hole. Think of all the bad choices made due to sunk costs.... But as time goes by, the commuter might say "my car is getting old....Im not ready for a new one, maybe Ill take expo to stop putting so many miles on this thing..." And others say "I want an apartment on exposition so I can take the train to my job downtown" and they arrive with no expectation of driving. ....that came out rather long. Ill be updating page one with the results.
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Post by jamesinclair on Aug 16, 2012 0:19:18 GMT -8
Just to add to that, every single member here who guessed ridership UNDERestimated it during the initial guessing period.
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