USA TODAY: Ridership on public transportation last year grew 1.1% to 10.7 billion trips, the highest total since 1956, according to new data from the American Public Transportation Association.
Since 1995, transit ridership is up 37.2%, which outpaced the national population growth of 20.3%, says Michael Melaniphy, [American Public Transportation Association ] president and CEO…
[Alan Pisarski, editor of the Commuting in America series] notes, however, that while transit carried more trips last year than at any time since the Eisenhower administration, its share of the transportation mode – that is, the percentage of commuters who take transit versus driving, walking, etc. – is still well below what it was in the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s… (more)
EDITOR: Instead of funding unemployment insurance, food stamps and other necessary subsidies for the jobless, the USA could have been providing fiscal stimulus to over come the recession over the past six years through upgrading our deplorably aged transportation system. Then we would have had a real asset for our money.
