PlanItMetro

Metrorail ridership isn’t only about rush hour! Here’s a deeper look at why off-peak riders travel, and what segments are most traveled.

You may not be surprised that the peak period travel on Metrorail is dominated by commuting and business related trips.  Every day from opening to 9:30am, nearly 90 percent of passengers travel to work and business.  However do you know that over almost a third of daily ridership takes place in the off peak?  This post explores what is happening during weekday off-peak periods.

The weekday “off-peak” time typically refers to the weekday midday period (9:30am to 3:00pm) and the weekday evening period (from 7:00pm to closing), excluding late night service on Friday and Saturdays between midnight and 3:00am. In recent years, weekday off-peak travel demand has remained stable at 32 percent of the daily ridership, with the midday ridership at 19-20 percent and the evening ridership at 12 percent.

Most non-work trips, such as personal, recreational, and shopping trips, occur during the off-peak times and are spread fairly evenly between the midday and evening, as illustrated in Figure 1. 

Figure 1: Percentage of Non-Work Trips by Time of Day (2012 Metrorail Passenger Survey)

The off-peak, non-work travel market has showed strong growth between 2007 and 2012 (our last two passenger surveys where we can distinguish between work and non-work travel). According to the Metrorail passenger surveys, off-peak non-work trips grew by 15 percent for the midday and evening from 2007 to 2012, higher than the 9 percent increase in the daily non-work trips. Read more…

Almost one in five trips on Metrorail are NOT work-related. Who is making these trips, and where and why are they making them?

Metrorail is how many of us in the region get to work.  But, as we will illustrate below, many of us also use it to do other things.

Using data from the 2012 Metrorail Passenger Survey, we were able to determine that about 125,000 or 17% trips on an average weekday do not involve travel either to or from ones’ place of work.   This is virtually identical to the results from the 2007 survey.  In order to understand how people use the system for non-work trips, we sorted out everyone who is either going to or coming from work from everyone else.    For example, a trip stopping off at the store after work would not be counted; however, a trip starting out at home and traveling to school would be counted.  In terms of where these non-work trips are going, most are returning home followed by “personal trip” and “shopping or meal.”  

Read more…