Does climate effect transit ridership?

[llamaorama]

First, we all know that there are regional differences in the way American cities in particular are built. Cities in the "Sun Belt" are sprawly and not as suited to transit as cities in the Northeast.

But, assume everything was equal. Imagine if it were possible to place a bunch of entirely identical cities in different climate regions. Would very cold or very hot or very rainy climates negative, or positively effect transit usage?

Does bad weather discourage people from standing outside at bus stops or train platforms and push people to use cars? Conversely, does nasty weather push people onto buses and trains over short distances that could be walked? Do certain climates perhaps favor certain modes of transportation - do heavy trams with metal wheels perform better in snow that cars or buses, for example?

[Via Chicago]

speaking for myself, i cancel my transit card from roughly March-November and rely on bike almost exclusively, outside of rainy days. i imagine theres a not insignificant amount of seasonal riders out there, and im sure it has an impact once the weather turns cold again and cycling is no longer completely viable. how big an impact though i cant say, and im sure more than offset by the fact that summer is tourism season and all the accompanying events means that the system is likely experiencing higher usage anyway

[Steely Dan]

^ yep.

i try to bike year-round as much as possible, but i certainly rely on transit more in the winter months if i wake up to 6" of snow on the ground or -20 windchills or other winter absurdities like that.

[Muji]

Assuming all else is equal as you said then my anecdotal experience is undeniably yes. I tend to make fewer trips (transit or not) on extremely hot or extremely cold days, and even short waits for a bus can be miserable in humid summer weather. On the flip side, I am also a regular bicycle commuter, and more likely to take the bus to work in hot weather, or days with heavy rain/snow.

Though I'm no expert, I remember reading from knowledgeable sources that in the grand scheme or things, the true drivers of transit ridership are things like coverage/frequency/land use, and that climate plays a relatively minor role.

[jtown,man]

Yes. But looking at climate alone is wrong because if that were the main reasoning for rideship numbers LA would be #1 in the country.

Climate
Culture
Demographics
Urban built form
Policies

All these things help decide for a region on what their transit patterns will end up being. Climate for me personally does affect my choices. I wont bike to school in heat and humidity. I won't wait for the train/bus in really bad heat and humidity, so I drive on these days. I'll take transit in extreme cold although in any extreme weather I am much more likely to drive.

[Busy Bee]

Since you only need one example to answer your question...

My car is buried in snow and streets are covered in ice, I think I'll take the train.

So, yes, climate affects transit ridership.

[SFBruin]

I am of the opinion that colder climates encourage dense development, and therefore more transit ridership per capita, but my training data for this is basically the cities of the United States (specifically SF, LA and Chi).

Would be curious if you could do a regression on this, but I think that there are too many extraneous factors to deal with that you may not get any meaningful results.

[electricron]

Originally Posted by Busy Bee

Since you only need one example to answer your question...

My car is buried in snow and streets are covered in ice, I think I'll take the train.

So, yes, climate affects transit ridership.

If Dallas was under 3 inches of snow and ice, neither its buses or trains would be running. So yes, climate can affect transit ridership, but not always for the good. How many times every winter do we read the NEC is down due to bad weather? Every time there's 3 feet of snow on the tracks....

[Steely Dan]

^ over the past 2 decades i can only remember one time when a blizzard shut down chicago's el system. it was the "Snowpocalypse" of 2011, the 3rd snowiest blizzard in chicago history when 21.2" of the white stuff was dumped on the city. the whole city was completely shut-down (a rare event for a city well-equipped to handle snow), pretty much no one went anywhere for a day, even lake shore drive (one of the city's main expressways) was closed. it took about a day to get el service fully restored if i recall correctly.

with the exception of truly historic snow-fall events, it seems that if the CTA just keeps running the trains often enough during normal snowfalls, then the snow doesn't have time to build up enough to impede the trains.

chicago's Metra commuter rail system seems to struggle more with snow/ice issues, but i believe that's more due to switching problems. maybe it's because commuter trains don't run nearly as frequently as the el trains do, and thus the snow has more time to accumulate on the tracks/switches?