Public Transit News / Current Events (MN only)

[J. Mc]

FWIW the W. 7th sinkhole has been repaired and 54/74 are now back to regular routing on that segment.

[daveybabymsp]

Data from APTA/Transit App is showing ridership growth YOY starting mid august after a stagnant/declining year. Not official numbers, but a good sign if accurate!

https://transitapp.com/APTA

[angrysuburbanite]

Fun facts: the last 6 weeks (33-38) is now the longest streak of 1m+ weekly rides since covid, beating the 3 week streak between weeks 36 and 38 last year. Last week saw +109,944 rides despite the Blue Line shutdown, too. That marks the first non-holiday week that Metro Transit has hit 70% of pre-covid ridership. Assuming Saturday saw ~115,000 rides and Sunday ~100,000, this amounts to about 180,000 daily rides. We'll see official August numbers in a couple of days, but ridership is now only about 800,000 rides away from meeting 2024 numbers. Just 4 weeks ago that difference was about 1.2 million, so the gap is closing.

Also noteworthy that MVTA has seen a huge surge in ridership, jumping from 30-40% of pre-covid ridership to 55-60% in only a couple weeks, with the last four weeks being the agency's highest weeks since 2020. Last week saw 10,675 more rides than the same week in 2024.

[angrysuburbanite]

The official August numbers are available now. Ridership did increase up to 145,054 weekday rides, the highest seen so far this year and 0.94% higher than last year (143,695), but I'm struggling to see where this increase is coming from based on the data.
- Blue Line saw 18,003 daily rides, still down 7.01% from 2024
- Green Line has its second month of abysmal performance at 19,700 daily rides, down 13% from 2024.
- Orange Line continues to surge, up 21.16% from 2024 at 2,405 daily rides
- Gold Line plateaus at 1,461 daily rides, though this is a little higher than last month
- A Line saw more State Fair use this year compared to last year by 3.46% to 5,173 daily rides overall
- B Line continues to log growth increasing to 8,690 from about 8,400 the previous month
- C Line is still down 5.3% from last year at 5,229 daily rides
- D Line is also still down 2.2% from last year at 13,108 daily rides
- Regular bus increases from July, but is still down 7% from last year at 70,489 daily rides. Factoring in the B Line, however, regular bus is up about 4.5%.
- Systemwide Saturday is down -0.5% but Sunday is up 5.4

[HuskyGrad]

The official August numbers are available now. Ridership did increase up to 145,054 weekday rides, the highest seen so far this year and 0.94% higher than last year (143,695), but I'm struggling to see where this increase is coming from based on the data.
- Blue Line saw 18,003 daily rides, still down 7.01% from 2024
- Green Line has its second month of abysmal performance at 19,700 daily rides, down 13% from 2024.
- Orange Line continues to surge, up 21.16% from 2024 at 2,405 daily rides
- Gold Line plateaus at 1,461 daily rides, though this is a little higher than last month
- A Line saw more State Fair use this year compared to last year by 3.46% to 5,173 daily rides overall
- B Line continues to log growth increasing to 8,690 from about 8,400 the previous month
- C Line is still down 5.3% from last year at 5,229 daily rides
- D Line is also still down 2.2% from last year at 13,108 daily rides
- Regular bus increases from July, but is still down 7% from last year at 70,489 daily rides. Factoring in the B Line, however, regular bus is up about 4.5%.
- Systemwide Saturday is down -0.5% but Sunday is up 5.4

Are two-car trains actually driving people away from light rail due to the reduction in seats?

[Bakken2016]

The official August numbers are available now. Ridership did increase up to 145,054 weekday rides, the highest seen so far this year and 0.94% higher than last year (143,695), but I'm struggling to see where this increase is coming from based on the data.
- Blue Line saw 18,003 daily rides, still down 7.01% from 2024
- Green Line has its second month of abysmal performance at 19,700 daily rides, down 13% from 2024.
- Orange Line continues to surge, up 21.16% from 2024 at 2,405 daily rides
- Gold Line plateaus at 1,461 daily rides, though this is a little higher than last month
- A Line saw more State Fair use this year compared to last year by 3.46% to 5,173 daily rides overall
- B Line continues to log growth increasing to 8,690 from about 8,400 the previous month
- C Line is still down 5.3% from last year at 5,229 daily rides
- D Line is also still down 2.2% from last year at 13,108 daily rides
- Regular bus increases from July, but is still down 7% from last year at 70,489 daily rides. Factoring in the B Line, however, regular bus is up about 4.5%.
- Systemwide Saturday is down -0.5% but Sunday is up 5.4

Are two-car trains actually driving people away from light rail due to the reduction in seats?

It’s honestly more likely that its frequency of service, people got used to 10 min trains! Also the Green Line used to run every 15 mins until like midnight. It now runs every 30 mins after 9:30p


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[MSPtoMKE]

Well, at least the light rail frequency is increasing to every 12 mins starting at around 5:30 am instead of 10:30 am or so starting when the Blue Line reopens this weekend. But more late night service is sorely needed.

[Tiller]

How late did we have at least hourly service on the green line before covid? I could have sworn circa 2018/2019ish it was basically 24 hours, so I could use the green line to get home if I was out and about.

One of the benefits to non-peak and weekend service is that by broadening the span of service - even if ridership isn't super high during those off periods - it increases ridership all day by enabling return trips. If I could go to the bank and grocery store at 5pm but I can't get home at 8pm, then I wouldn't take transit at 5pm.

The green line goes through both downtowns and the U of MN, so I bet there was a lot of utility in that overnight service. I would be curious to see a breakdown of pre-covid ridership by time of day, since there could be a lot of demand for round trips that don't work anymore now because of the late night/overnight cuts.

[Tcmetro]

The Green Line was 24 hours, but I believe at some point weekday overnight service was transitioned to bus.

[J. Mc]

The Green Line was 24 hours, but I believe at some point weekday overnight service was transitioned to bus.

There was a Green Line Bus operating trips from roughly 2am-4am with hourly frequency as of the December 2019 service change.
https://web.archive.org/web/20191210164 ... enLine.pdf

IIRC the 16 operated into downtown Minneapolis on certain overnight trips once Green Line service commenced, then they switched to operating additional trains overnight at some point after. I can't recall if those trains were daily, or just Fri-Sun. The 16 was transferred, along with the 84, to MTS for the contract with MTN in December 2018 and the route was shortened to end at Fairview. Both routes were eventually folded into the First Transit contract following MTN's dismal performance and eventually dropped completely in 2020 or 2021.

[DanPatchToget]

Having recently taken the 546 that's now routed on Normandale Boulevard, it's nice to have a bus service walking distance from my house again, and unlike the old 589 it operates throughout the day with consistent frequency. Too bad it wasn't around when I was going to the U as I would've been a daily rider as long as the transfer time worked with the 465. The only issue is if your stop isn't at one of the signalized intersections and you have to cross Normandale then you might be waiting awhile. During rush hour you might as well get on/off at one of the stops that are at a signalized intersection and just have a longer walk. Would be nice if Hennepin County put in a signalized crosswalk somewhere in between 102nd and Old Shakopee, but I know Normandale is intended to be a high-speed car sewer, not a multi-modal street.

[Tcmetro]

New Metro Transit routes starting in December:

345: Woodbury - MOA via Newport, West St. Paul, and the Airport.
https://www.metrotransit.org/route-345

725: Osseo - Northtown via Starlite, 85th Ave, and Springbrook Dr.
https://www.metrotransit.org/route-725

827: Minneapolis - Anoka via Marshall St, Northtown, and Coon Rapids Blvd, replacing the 852.
https://www.metrotransit.org/route-827

These are all very important suburban links and it's great to see new coverage and more service to the airport.

[DanPatchToget]

Route 827 should be fine, the others I'm not so sure. Route 345 looks like an attempt at a suburb-to-suburb express, and even with the airport and Mall of America I don't know if that will be enough to get people on board. I hope it does well as it's a nice crosstown service, but I fear it will perform extremely poorly and Metro Transit will just pull the plug on it instead of making adjustments so it's more useful.

While it's nice to see downtown Osseo get fixed-route service, it seems like the Arbor Lakes area would make more sense, and I wonder if this is another example of suburban opt-outs being overly protective of their turf.

[angrysuburbanite]

345 is the same as the 354 planned in Network Now, but runs 7 days of the week rather than 5. I think it will do OK but it is an extremely important coverage route more than anything. The 686 surpassed my expectations and this is pretty similar. I'm a little disappointed the 725 is using minibuses rather than regular buses since minibuses make it less substantial, but it is still an important link.

While it's nice to see downtown Osseo get fixed-route service, it seems like the Arbor Lakes area would make more sense, and I wonder if this is another example of suburban opt-outs being overly protective of their turf.

For what it is worth, Arbor Lakes will be getting a local bus connection when the Blue Line opens and that will be operated by Maple Grove Transit. I posted the Maple Grove transit commission meeting discussing this in the Suburban Transit topic.

[DanPatchToget]

I don't see why we should have to wait for a light rail line that hasn't broken ground and isn't even 100% certain to happen yet when a simple bus route or extension of an existing bus route could happen today.

[J. Mc]

I'm surprised they're already implementing the 345 as I thought it would be done closer to when the full G line service starts. Interesting they extended to MOA, it seems logical though. I hope it will be classed as a regular route vs. an express so there's not a fare surcharge.

...I'm a little disappointed the 725 is using minibuses rather than regular buses since minibuses make it less substantial, but it is still an important link.

I will note the newer minibuses MTS has been replacing older units with this year have a surprisingly smooth and quiet ride, so they have improved somewhat compared to the moving truck ride quality one could expect 10-15 years ago.

[Bakken2016]

I'm surprised they're already implementing the 345 as I thought it would be done closer to when the full G line service starts. Interesting they extended to MOA, it seems logical though. I hope it will be classed as a regular route vs. an express so there's not a fare surcharge.

It is being classified as limited stop(i.e 54), so no fare surcharge.

[twincitizen]

I'm surprised they're already implementing the 345 as I thought it would be done closer to when the full G line service starts. Interesting they extended to MOA, it seems logical though.

Agreed. I previously suggested extending the G to T1 via Hwy. 62. This route looks good on the map filling a gap with no bus service at all. Linking the ends of the Gold Line and G Line with MOA Transit Center seems like a sound idea. I'm curious what the trip times will be for end-to-end rides from Woodbury's Woodlane Station to MOA.

Mendota Heights land use is apparently so transit-unsupportive that the bus won't make any stops between the G Line and Terminal 1, despite the fact that the bus will hit some red lights on Hwy. 62 along the way. I'd add a single stop at MN-149/Dodd Rd. That's kind of Mendota Heights' town center area with a good amount of housing and retail jobs. Ideally a stop at Dodd and transit signal priority or at least queue jumps at the other stoplights along 62.

[J. Mc]

As of April 2025 there still is/or was abandoned MVTA stops on 62 at Lexington, so there is precedent. Those were for the former 446P branch that ran once a day and served as a reverse commute option and connection to the Parkview Plaza (75, 452). The 436 may have served that intersection as well at one point.
https://maps.app.goo.gl/aerNooBDwiR7vJsMA

[angrysuburbanite]

We're almost to November, which means new ridership data will be out soon! I am super eager to see this data since we finally have a clear surge in ridership. Looking at the APTA data posted earlier, there is a spike for both MVTA and Metro Transit starting at around weeks 30-33. It was similar to 2024, but the difference is that it is holding: the last 9 weeks have seen over 1 million riders. It looks like the LRT shutdown has not had a big effect on the ridership momentum. Based on recent data it wouldn't surprise me if LRT losses were offset by bus gains (as was the case in August). Nonetheless, we have been consistently around 66-70% of pre-COVID ridership for the better part of the last 2 months. If this trend continues, it is possible that Metro will beat 2024, though not by much. YTD ridership is now down by only 1.3% (a difference of about 400,000 rides).