Remember how Millennials and other young people were giving up cars and riding transit instead? It turns out, not so much. In fact, the latest word is that Millennials are the ones who are killing transit, or at least the DC Metro.
This is based on a study by a company called Teralytics. While the study itself isn’t available on line, charts published in the above-linked article indicate that Metro Rail usage by people in the 18-29-year age class dropped 21 percent between April 2016 and April 2018, while declines were successively smaller in successively older age classes, with the 60-year-plus class ridership declining by only 5 percent. Teralytics gathered this data from the movements of cell phones connected to one of the “big four” wireless carriers that serves more than a quarter of the DC population (no privacy concerns here, I’m sure!).
Since the Antiplanner is downloading 2017 American Community Survey data, I wondered if those data could confirm this conclusion. Table B08101 reports means of transportation to work by age classes. I downloaded this table for the usual states, counties, cities, and urban areas for every year from 2005 through 2017. It turns out that, if I squint at the data the right way, it seems to support Teralytics’ conclusion. But when I take a broader view, it isn’t quite so certain. Continue reading
