Now Free, Jax Skyway Ridership Doubles

[Lakelander]

The Jacksonville Transportation Authority has eliminated charging fares for the skyway for three months to test how ridership responds. In the first week, ridership has quickly doubled:

Skyway ridership doubles with free fare

It's been a week since the Jacksonville Transportation Authority stopped charging riders to use the Skyway. Since then, ridership has nearly doubled on the downtown system.

Alan Boree is one of those new riders and said the free fare is enticing.

"I enjoyed it," he said. "Maybe people will ride it more often."

Boree said he will probably ride it again sometime in the next three months. That's how long JTA plans to run the test of not charging to ride the Skyway.

JTA said the first week is very promising. Ridership is up 100 percent.

Before it was free, 1,700 people rode the Skyway a day, on average. Last Monday was the first free day and JTA saw a big increase, with 3,813 people riding the Skyway. There were slightly less on Tuesday, with 3,751 riding.

JTA began the free service after a Channel 4 investigation found it wasn't hard to catch people skipping out on fares. Channel 4 also highlighted broken equipment and lack of maintenance.

JTA began a crackdown and said equipment replacement was just too expensive. It then announced as part of a test it will run the Skyway free for three months.

JTA said it's changing over to a new payment system, and at the end of April it will decided if the system will remain free or go back to charging a fare.

http://www.news4jax.com/news/Skyway-...y/-/index.html

[FLAWDA-FELLA]

Cool, but I thought the Skyway was already strapped for cash.

[brickell]

Life became a lot easier once it went free down here. I can't imagine they we're bring in much revenue before anyway.

[ThatFloridaDude]

They should have done like Lymmo in Orlando!

[Lakelander]

Originally Posted by FLAWDA-FELLA

Cool, but I thought the Skyway was already strapped for cash.

It "loses" money like every other mass transit system, highway, public school, library, park, fire and police station in the country. You're not really making much off of charging 1,700 riders/day a $0.50 fare. I would not be surprised if the FTA gives them more money for having higher ridership than the fares generated annually.

[Bobdreamz]

Good news for Jax! The same thing happened in Miami when we got rid of the fares for Metromover downtown. I think Miami's system caries about 40,000 riders a day now. Does Jacksonville have a sales tax for transit like Miami does?

[JaguarReign]

It's not like anyone was paying before anyway. The coin operators never worked and on a number of occasions, it still wouldn't let me through after I paid, so I would have to go around the turnstiles, which is very easy to do, I might add. What they should do is start having ads on at the stations and the skyway cars. That would bring up revenue.

[FLAWDA-FELLA]

Saw on the local news yesterday, that the Skyway will remain free up till October 2012.

[TampaMike]

Any current numbers on the ridership level?

Someone, from the city or just someone that cares about the city, should be asking riders if they would pay to ride the system after Oct. 2012

[tampasteve]

Q1 ridership from APTA was 2,800 per day.

Steve

[Lakelander]

Originally Posted by TampaMike

Any current numbers on the ridership level?

Someone, from the city or just someone that cares about the city, should be asking riders if they would pay to ride the system after Oct. 2012

What really needs to be addressed is the duplication of bus service. Several bus routes parallel the skyway's path through downtown, providing service to the same destinations. If you're using a bus to get downtown, there's really no reason to use the skyway.

If JTA really wants to save money and significantly increase skyway ridership, route duplication needs to be eliminated. This would effectively turn the skyway into a transit spine and central element of downtown itself, being the connection piece between local bus lines.

[Lakelander]

Jacksonville Skyway will remain free for another year

Clinton Forbes, JTA director of mass transit, said ridership in the Skyway has increased by 61 percent from February to July of this year compared to the same time frame in 2011.

During that period, there were about 296,000 passengers in 2011 and 481,000 passengers this year.

JTA expects to lose about $130,000 in revenue by not charging. But that will be offset because JTA won’t have to install a new STAR card fare system that would cost $200,000, Forbes said.

full article: http://jacksonville.com/news/florida...e-another-year

[SDK4]

Fantastic, now they just need to extend it. Maybe the Jags stadium? That seems doable and would increase the usage a ton on fall weekends.

[Lakelander]

Back in February, the skyway only had 1,700 riders a day. Recently released transit ridership numbers indicate it now gets 5,100 riders a day. Pretty impressive, considering what has happened by making it free fare and eliminating duplicate bus routes along the corridor.

http://www.apta.com/resources/statis...rship-APTA.pdf

[starbuc jupiter]

this is great
I really believe there are other urban cores that would benefit so much from a small metro like this.

[jzquince69]

I would rather have that in downtown Orlando than the Lymmo line. But I would not make it free.

[spenser1058]

Originally Posted by jzquince69

I would rather have that in downtown Orlando than the Lymmo line. But I would not make it free.

It's great for Jax of course and I congratulate them. What is tragic is, when Orlando, Jax and other cities were competing for the grants to build it, Orlando's project was a peoplemover connecting what is today Colonial Plaza, Target and Fashion Square. At the time, downtown O-town was on nobody's radar and their bid did not go far. Amazing how the times have changed!

[Lakelander]

Press release from last week's One Spark festival:

JTA Skyway moves thousands during One Spark

The Jacksonville Transportation Authority (JTA) announced that last week’s One Spark festival was a tremendous success for Skyway ridership. Approximately 44,282 Skyway boardings took place during the inaugural crowd-sourcing event, marking a 129 percent increase in weekday ridership.

Average weekday ridership grew from roughly 4,500 passengers per day to 10,289 passengers per day, as downtown residents, employees and festivalgoers took advantage of the free-to-ride system. The Skyway, typically closed on weekends, remained open through Sunday and offered departures every three to six minutes.

“We are thrilled to have played a role in this exciting event by helping people move around downtown Jacksonville safely and efficiently,” said JTA Executive Director and CEO Nathaniel “Nat” Ford, Sr. “These ridership numbers demonstrate that the Skyway is a convenient and viable means of transportation. I anticipate that these positive trends will continue even after One Spark.”

Daily ridership totals during the One Spark festival were:

1. April 17, 2013 – 9,798
2. April 18, 2013 – 9,269
3. April 19, 2013 – 11,801
4. April 20, 2013 – 10,597
5. April 21, 2013 – 2,817

Source: Jacksonville Transportation Authority

[Lakelander]

Originally Posted by spenser1058

It's great for Jax of course and I congratulate them. What is tragic is, when Orlando, Jax and other cities were competing for the grants to build it, Orlando's project was a peoplemover connecting what is today Colonial Plaza, Target and Fashion Square. At the time, downtown O-town was on nobody's radar and their bid did not go far. Amazing how the times have changed!

Colonial Plaza to Fashion Square? What a horrible concept.

[Lakelander]

Originally Posted by jzquince69

I would rather have that in downtown Orlando than the Lymmo line. But I would not make it free.

Miami's metromover is free too. If you think about it, the argument to charge a $0.25 to $0.50 fare is a shaky one because those pennies earned negatively impact ridership and don't add up to even 25% of what it cost to operate your system. On the other hand, the higher your ridership numbers are, the more federal money you get to operate your mass transit system.