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Although it has been several years since the state-imposed lockdowns in response to the COVID-19 virus in Washington state, Sound Transit’s ridership and revenue have remained below pre-pandemic levels despite the expansion of services since then.
One transit expert attributes that in part on a shift toward remote work, as other metro transit systems in the country are also suffering from decreased ridership numbers, while Sound Transit notes boarding levels for some of its services have since recovered.
“Transit run the same routes they ran 100 years ago,” Randal O’Toole told The Center Square.
O’Toole is a Cato Institute senior fellow working on urban growth, public land, and transportation issues.
“When we build light rail, we build lines that all focus on downtown," he said. "That’s fine, 100 years ago when all the jobs were downtown. They’re not downtown [anymore].”
Prior to the 2020-2021 lockdowns, Sound Transit ridership increased year-over-year between 1999 and 2018, when annual boardings increased from a few million in 1999 to 47.3 million in 2018. O’Toole says much of that the growth was “because of migration to downtown” for new jobs at Amazon and other companies as Seattle experienced a tech boom.
However, in 2020 during the lockdowns, ridership fell to 15.5 million, a 67% decrease in boardings. Consequently, fare revenue also plunged from $96.9 million in 2019 to just $30.6 million in 2020, a 68% decrease.
However, from there ridership and fare revenues experienced separate trends. Although ridership increased slightly in 2021 to 17.4 million, fares actually decreased to $28.1 million. While both ridership and revenue increased in 2022, they did so at separate rates; ridership jumped by 83% compared to 2021, while fare revenue increased by just 60%.
According to Sound Transit’s 2022 fare revenue report “in past years, ridership and fare revenue were closely linked, with similar increases or decreases. The main cause of the difference is lower fare payment compliance – particularly on Link light rail – when compared to pre-pandemic levels.”
Sound Transit Media Relations Manager John Gallagher wrote in an email to The Center Square that the agency’s board “has made farebox recovering a priority, which is why we established our fare ambassador program to check fares onboard. Fare checking was suspended during the pandemic, and we recognized the need to re-establish the importance of paying to ride. We have continued to expand the fare ambassador program so that riders will be reminded of the expectation that they should pay and will do so.”
Ridership as of 2023 had increased to 37.3 million, while revenue has increased to $51.8 million. While that represents a recovery for both compared to 2020-2021, they are below 2019’s 46.9 million boardings and $96.9 million in fare revenue. That puts ridership 20% below 2019, while fare revenue generated is 47% below 2019.
O’Toole attributes this to the fact that many workers never returned to their workplace and continue to work remotely. While the percentage of employees working remotely isn’t as high as it was during the pandemic, “it’s still going to stay a lot higher than 5%,” which was the pre-pandemic amount.
“Instead of having transit system that respond to economic changes, transit agencies try and force economic changes on people so that people’s lifestyles fit the transit system’s they’ve designed, rather than designing transit system to fit people’s lifestyles,” he said.
The lower ridership and fares compared to pre-pandemic levels comes despite the expansion of Sound Transit services. In 2023, the regional transit agency extended the T Line by 2.4 miles to the Stadium District and the Hilltop area. Last year, the agency opened the initial segment of a Link 2 Line light rail service between Bellevue and Redmond as part of the East Link Extension. In August, the Lynnwood Link Extension opened, adding 8.5 miles of light rail line and four stations.
When asked about current annual boarding volumes, Gallagher wrote in an email that “ridership varies across different modes,” noting that Sounder and ST Express are “more heavily dependent on a commuter riders, and as such have been slower to recover as the return-to-office has been slower.”
He also noted that Link ridership overall is now above 2019 levels “which tells us that people are using Link to get around not just to work, but more generally to events and day-to-day activities.”
“Overall, we continue to see steady growth in ridership,” he added.
When it comes to recovery since the pandemic, Sound Transit’s faring better than other major transit systems nationwide. The Metropolitan Transportation Authority New York City in 2019 had 2.4 billion total boardings on its subways and buses. As of 2023, that figure had fallen to 1.57 billion. In 2023, the Chicago Transit Authority had 279 million passenger trips compared to 455.7 million trips in 2019.
One system that has rebounded as well as Sound Transit is the Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority, which had 284.9 million annual boardings on its bus and rail services, compared to 347.7 million in 2019.
Yet, O’Toole argues that “transit agencies weren’t working for people before the pandemic for people who don’t work downtown. Sound Transit was building a transit system that didn’t work for 95% of workers that worked anywhere other than downtown. It’s really inexcusable that we’re spending all of this money subsidizing transit ... that basically serves only downtown workers.”
The problem with making reforms, O’Toole says, is that transit funding models aren’t dependent on having riders. For example, Sound Transit’s fare revenue makes up just 2% of its annual budget compared to 63% coming from local tax sources.
“Right now, transit agencies are trying to figure out how to work the political system to extort taxpayer money to keep operating higher levels despite lower ridership,” O’Toole said. “Transit riders contribution to transit agency budgets have become so small. They really don’t care about the riders anymore.”
While Sound Transit didn't comment on any plans it has to increase ridership beyond 2019 levels or how it might impact future projects, Kevin Wallace told The Center Square that ridership data should give the agency’s board members pause.
Wallace is the president of Bellevue-based property developer Wallace Properties and was involved with negotiations with Sound Transit on the East Link connection while serving on the Bellevue City Council.
“We put all these eggs in this basket,” he said. “It’s important that it functions.”
He added that if ridership demand isn't high enough, “it’s time for a rethink of ST3 that hasn’t been built. How can you expect it [light rail] to work in the low-density areas like Issaquah and Everett?
“This whole thing is so political,” he said. “We made the infrastructure investments. What’s unfortunate now is what we invested in, is proving to not be as viable as we once thought. That’s the question for everybody, especially the electeds [Sound Transit Board of Directors]: Why is nobody changing course and instead pushing to go into areas where we know it will be even less effective?”