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The Lynx Blue Line averaged 15,121 weekday trips in April – surprisingly high ridership given the severe recession.
Charlotte's light-rail line had been averaging roughly 14,000 trips for much of the year, and the Charlotte Area Transit System expected it to decline because fewer people are working. But the Lynx carried 380,186 passengers for April, up more than 10 percent over the same time a year ago.
“I'm amazed that we aren't seeing bigger numbers in terms of losing ridership,” said CATS chief executive Keith Parker, who is leaving Charlotte to take the top transit job in San Antonio at the end of June. “Our customers are primarily people going to and from work.”
The drop in employment has hurt ridership on express buses, which are geared towards commuters. Regional express ridership from neighboring counties was down 13.9 percent compared with April 2008, and overall bus ridership was down 4.3 percent.
Another sign of the weak economy was ridership on the free Gold Rush, which runs uptown. It carried 18.8 percent fewer passengers in April.
The Lynx was expected to carry 9,100 passengers in its first year, and surpassed those projections. When gasoline hit $4 a gallon, ridership surged, topping 16,000 in the summer.
Transit officials see red
CATS officials Wednesday night also discussed with the Metropolitan Transit Commission the possibility of changing the color of two planned rail lines.
It has been proposed to change the color of the planned north corridor commuter rail line – now purple – to red. That would be a nod to Davidson College.
In addition, officials at UNCCharlotte had discussed changing the color of the Lynx extension – now planned as blue – to green. Green is the primary color of UNCCharlotte.
It's unlikely the MTC will vote to change the Lynx extension to green. CATS officials said the Lynx should be one color, and recommended against having a line that was half blue and half green. If the entire line's color were changed, it would cost between $200,000 and $500,000 to change existing signs.
The MTC decided to seek more public input before changing the color of the purple line to red.
The MTC also voted to recommend that the General Assembly include Mecklenburg in a bill that would allow it to raise an additional half-cent sales tax for mass transit.
