Item A: Joint Meeting with Lane Transit District Board of Directors

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ATTACHMENT B June 12, 2006 TO: Mayor Piercy and Eugene City Council Lane Transit District Board of Directors FROM: Mark Pangborn, General Manager RE: LTD Ridership and Service Attached to this memo are several charts and graphs to provide a picture of Lane Transit District today. Probably most important to note is the trend of increasing ridership--with consistent increases every month since March 2005. Almost 63,000 people in the Eugene-Springfield metropolitan area have bus passes--either through school or work programs. This number does not include people who regularly buy monthly or three- month passes. The relevance of each attachment is described below. At the meeting, staff will summarize current issues for the system and be available to answer questions from the Council or the Board. Increasing Ridership LTD is experiencing record ridership. It is always difficult to determine with any level of precision the reason for changes in ridership. LTD staff analysis suggests three primary reasons for the ridership increase: 1. The Student Transit Pass Program provides free transit service to all middle school and high school students in the Eugene-Springfield area. It is estimated that this program is responsible for a five percent system-wide ridership increase, which is about half of the ridership increase. 2. Rising gas prices certainly contribute to higher ridership. As might be expected, the ridership impact is greatest on the longest trips: Out-of-town routes (Junction City, Veneta, Cottage Grove, Pleasant Hill, and Blue River/McKenzie Bridge) have experienced ridership gains similar to the rest of the system. 3. General community growth and an improved economy contribute to general ridership growth. It can be expected that ridership growth will at least keep up with increases in population and employment. Attachment 1: Ridership Trends (July 1, 2004, projected through June 2006) This chart shows a rolling twelve-month average. The graph, therefore, shows how each month’s increase in ridership affects the annual average. LTD now estimates that there have been more than 9 million boardings on the system in the past 12 months, which is up approximately 10 percent from the previous 12-month period.