This summer, LTD reduced its bus fare rides across all ticket options by 50%. After surveys and analysis of the effectiveness and financial impact of the promotion, the agency said results show existing riders benefitted most, with work still needed.
Summers typically mean lower ridership, especially with fewer students using public transport to get to school.
LTD spokesperson Anni Katz said the timing provided LTD with the perfect opportunity to experiment with a reduced fare promotion.
“We just wanted to see, where are the areas where we can increase ridership?” she said. “It's a finite amount of time. We can do this 50% discount on all of our bus passes, day trips, single rides, everything, and just see if it gets more people to hop on the bus.”
Through surveys and research, LTD saw an increase in ridership compared to last summer, with mostly existing riders using transportation more often.
Katz said that proves costs are one reason people use LTD services less.
“There are still certain barriers for certain people,” she said, “and to have done Dollar Days and gone through this experiment, we know that reducing the prices was able to get more people more access to the system, which is great.”
Katz said more research will be done on how to potentially replicate the promotion, and bring new people onto buses across the county.
“We always want more people to try the bus. So whatever gets them on board, whether it's higher gas prices and people saying, ‘I need to like figure out a way to save a little bit of money,’ or people looking at the climate and saying, ‘It's clearly better to hop on a bus or ride my bike than it is to drive my single car to work every day,’” she said. “There’s definitely room to grow, always.”
