New York Subway Ridership Hits 65-Year High While Bus Ridership Declines

Stephen Miller sums up New York City's transit dichotomy: "While subway ridership hit a 65-year high last year, the story for surface transit in NYC is different. Bus ridership has yet to recover from a major round of service cuts in 2010, and in 2014 it lost some ground, according to new stats from the MTA."

The MTA announced last week the 65-year high in ridership, precipitated by a 2.6 percent rise in subway ridership to 1.751 billion customers in 2014. Obviously, the news is good for the system, though it leaves population growth out of the equation—that is to say that per capita subway ridership or mode share might be a better way to measure the growth of subway use in the city. An earlier article by Miller breaks down the subway statistics to the neighborhood level as well as making political points about the state's support of system maintenance.

Miller's recent article devotes more attention to the other untold story of New York City public transit—the bus system, which has been in steady decline for year, including last year's "record breaking" year. According to Miller, the decline in bus ridership was especially strong in Manhattan and Brooklyn, though bus ridership did increase in the Bronx and Staten Island.