Blog
Transit Shake-Up: How COVID-19 Has Shifted Transportation Identities in California’s Two Largest Cities
In the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, the transportation identities of California’s two most populous regions, the Bay Area and Los Angeles, have shifted. Historically, the Bay Area has been known for its robust transit system, while Los Angeles has been associated with sprawl and widespread car use. However, during the pandemic, Los Angeles has experienced higher per-capita transit use than the Bay Area, and the region has made more progress in recovering its pre-pandemic ridership, according to a Chronicle analysis.
National Transit Database figures reveal that transit ridership in Los Angeles did not drop to the same dramatic lows as in the Bay Area, where 95% of people stopped riding the region’s trains. Even at the height of stay-at-home orders in 2020, L.A.’s rail system was still bringing in about 33% of the 9 million or so monthly trips it saw in 2019, compared to BART, which did not reach that recovery milestone until early 2022.
Bus ridership in both regions has seen a much faster recovery, with L.A.’s largest bus operators recovering almost four-fifths of their pre-COVID trips, compared to 65% for the Bay Area’s top operators. However, telework has had a significant impact on Golden Gate Transit, which has only recovered 38% of its bus ridership, and trips crossing the Golden Gate Bridge into San Francisco have declined by more than 80%.
The recovery of transit ridership in both regions has been uneven, and both still have a way to go before they see 2019-level transit ridership. However, the Bay Area and L.A. agencies stand to benefit greatly if state legislators include a temporary subsidy in this year’s state budget. The most telling statistic showing how the pandemic has shifted transit use in both regions is in the significant changes seen in overall transit trips per-capita. L.A. saw more per-capita transit trips during the pandemic than the Bay Area, eroding the latter’s historic lead in this category.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Los_Angeles_County_Metropolitan_Transportation_Authority
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/San_Francisco_Municipal_Railway
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bay_Area_Rapid_Transit
https://stmdailynews.com/category/stm-blog/blog/
https://www.sfchronicle.com/sf/article/transit-ridership-recovery-la-17822493.php#photo-23583863
Source: San Francisco Chronicle, LA Metro, BART, SF MUNI