Amtrak FY 2010 Ridership Record

[ALC Rail Writer]

Strong performance shows demand for passenger rail continues to grow
WASHINGTON – Amtrak set a new annual ridership record of 28,716,857 passengers for the fiscal year ending September 30 and collected a record $1.74 billion in ticket revenue.The strong performance is evidence that the demand for passenger rail service is rising and that more Americans are choosing Amtrak — a greener and more convenient travel mode.

“We thank every passenger for choosing Amtrak to meet their intercity travel needs,”said President and CEO Joseph Boardman. “More and more people see passenger rail as a way to get to where they need to go, and when our front line employees put them first, it helps to bring passengers back for another trip.”

A year-over-year comparison of FY 2010 to FY 2009 shows total Amtrak ridership grew by 5.7 percent, or about 1.55 million passengers, and all Amtrak business lines experienced growth including the Northeast Corridor (up 4.3 percent), long-distance trains (up 6.6 percent),and state-supported and other short-distance routes (up 6.5 percent.) Over the same period,ticket revenue increased 9 percent, or more than $140 million.

The only place I could find the release

 

[Eric S]

Here's the press release from Amtrak.com:

http://www.amtrak.com/servlet/BlobServer?blobcol=urldata&blobtable=MungoBlobs&blobkey=id&blobwhere=1249215885709&blobheader=application%2Fpdf&blobheadername1=Content-disposition&blobheadervalue1=attachment;filename=Amtrak_ATK-10-134_Amtrak_Sets_Ridership_&_Revenue_Records_in_FY_2010_(10-11-10).pdf

 

[Big Iron]

Hear, Hear!!!! Hopefully major media will pick this up a run with it. Too bad Amtrak has to blow its own horn.

 

[Eric S]

Looking a little closer, both ridership and revenue has topped the previous records achieved in 2008 on both long-distance and on state-supported/short-distance trains, but not yet on Northeast Corridor trains (the 3 categories of trains Amtrak uses).

EDIT: To be clearer:

All 3 categories achieved records in 2008, were down some in 2009 (compared to 2008), and all 3 were up in 2010 (compared to 2009). 2010 numbers for NEC trains were above 2009 numbers but still less than 2008 numbers. L-D and state/S-D trains recorded numbers in 2010 that were higher than both 2009 and 2008.

 

[Ispolkom]

How is number of passengers a useful metric? Wouldn't passenger-miles be a much better one?

 

[Eric S]

How is number of passengers a useful metric? Wouldn't passenger-miles be a much better one?

Not disagreeing with you, but for whatever reason, Amtrak regularly releases "passenger" numbers but it seems much harder to find "passenger-miles" numbers.

 

[jis]

How is number of passengers a useful metric? Wouldn't passenger-miles be a much better one?

Not disagreeing with you, but for whatever reason, Amtrak regularly releases "passenger" numbers but it seems much harder to find "passenger-miles" numbers.

Passenger miles is a useful number for analytical purposes but not for public relations and lobbying purposes. Passengers vote and revenues pay for the upkeep of the system and organization. Hence those are important to publicize. Passenger miles and passenger miles per train mile, CASM and RASM are useful numbers for analysis, but most of the public wouldn't know what to make of them.

 

[George Harris]

How is number of passengers a useful metric? Wouldn't passenger-miles be a much better one?

Not disagreeing with you, but for whatever reason, Amtrak regularly releases "passenger" numbers but it seems much harder to find "passenger-miles" numbers.

This method of counting has been one of my frustrations for a long time. Using passengers instead of passenger miles makes the runs carring short distance rider look better than they really are at the expenss of the runs carrying long distance passengers. Given that Amtrak is and always has been fixated on the Northeast, to do things this way serves their purpose in making the Northeast Corridor look much better tnat the national trains despite the Northeast being the worst sinkhole for money.

 

[Ispolkom]

This method of counting has been one of my frustrations for a long time. Using passengers instead of passenger miles makes the runs carring short distance rider look better than they really are at the expenss of the runs carrying long distance passengers. Given that Amtrak is and always has been fixated on the Northeast, to do things this way serves their purpose in making the Northeast Corridor look much better tnat the national trains despite the Northeast being the worst sinkhole for money.

This is exactly what I suspect. Jis is right that passenger numbers are better for lobbying, the question is what kind of lobbying.

I don't think that people would be confused by passenger-miles statistics. They seem to make sense of miles-per-gallon numbers when comparing autos, after all.

In any case, I think that these numbers are nearly meaningless. They count as equal both my trip from Milwaukee to Milwaukee Airport and my trip from Los Angeles to Portland.

 

[Devil's Advocate]

I don't think that people would be confused by passenger-miles statistics. They seem to make sense of miles-per-gallon numbers when comparing autos, after all.

Which explains how we managed to improve our vehicular average of 14 MPG in 1923 to an outstanding 17.2 MPG in 2006? Please. <_<

 

[transit54]

I think both passengers and passenger miles are valid statistics in their own right. In one sense, more local public transportation reports ridership, and I think Amtrak follows suit to have comparable figures for political purposes. Working in transit, I have been very engrained with the mantra of 'ridership, ridership, ridership,' as it builds the political case for expanded service.

The number of passengers who ride is important because it tells those who fund Amtrak how many trips Amtrak plays a role in. It's much easier to wrap your head around the idea that if Amtrak were eliminated, people would have to choose other means for 28.7 million trips. Knowing that Amtrak generated X number of passenger miles sort of strips away the human scale of the number of trips people take on the train. When the Burlington Free Press runs a story of 'Vermonter ridership up 27%' - anyone can pick that up and understand that more people are taking the train. 'Vermonter passenger miles up X%' doesn't have the same effect. Besides, from a political perspective its more important that people are taking the train and less about where they are going. I'd probably rather that hundreds of people are taking it to get around Vermont than only a few who are going all the way to DC. The same applies for LD trains - if lots of people are taking the train to visit relatives one state over, isn't that more significant than a few people riding from major cities on each end? Ridership is story of how many people are embracing the service (obviously, one person can generate a lot of ridership, but that person is also disproportionately affected if service is cut). Politicians care more about how many votes will be gained/lost if service is cut than how far people are taking the train. And ridership tells them the former.

The one issue I see with passenger miles is that frequently customers will purchase tickets to a particular point but get off before that point. For instance, I'm now purchasing my Vermonter tickets to Stamford, CT, when I may get off in Bridgeport, CT (since it's the same cost and allows me the option of either station). But I think that's a minor issue. It's definitely a good statistic for other reasons. I'm sure Amtrak has both in the annual report - but ridership is the right number to include in press releases.

 

[Ryan]

I don't think that people would be confused by passenger-miles statistics. They seem to make sense of miles-per-gallon numbers when comparing autos, after all.

Which explains how we managed to improve our vehicular average of 14 MPG in 1923 to an outstanding 17.2 MPG in 2006? Please. <_<

Oh, we understand just fine.

We just don't care.

 

[afigg]

This method of counting has been one of my frustrations for a long time. Using passengers instead of passenger miles makes the runs carring short distance rider look better than they really are at the expenss of the runs carrying long distance passengers. Given that Amtrak is and always has been fixated on the Northeast, to do things this way serves their purpose in making the Northeast Corridor look much better tnat the national trains despite the Northeast being the worst sinkhole for money.

The total passenger miles for all Amtrak trains are in the monthly reports if you want the numbers. But this is an Amtrak press release for publicity, not something for the inside baseball crowd.

The August 2010 report has not been posted yet, but the July 2010 and 2009 reports are available. For the first 10 months of FY10, the total passenger miles were 5,243,663,000 (for 23,889,000 passengers) while the same period for FY09, the miles were 4,858,792,000 (for 22,518,000 passengers). So the total passenger miles are up a bit more percentage wise than total passengers.

But a press release that says Amtrak has 6 something billion passenger miles is not a number that people can relate to. No, stick with total number of passengers and revenue. The important aspect for the FY10 numbers is that having record ridership and revenue help with the political narrative going into what will be a bumpier time in Congress. Flat or declining ridership numbers would not.

 

[Crescent ATN & TCL]

This method of counting has been one of my frustrations for a long time. Using passengers instead of passenger miles makes the runs carring short distance rider look better than they really are at the expenss of the runs carrying long distance passengers. Given that Amtrak is and always has been fixated on the Northeast, to do things this way serves their purpose in making the Northeast Corridor look much better tnat the national trains despite the Northeast being the worst sinkhole for money.

The total passenger miles for all Amtrak trains are in the monthly reports if you want the numbers. But this is an Amtrak press release for publicity, not something for the inside baseball crowd.

The August 2010 report has not been posted yet, but the July 2010 and 2009 reports are available. For the first 10 months of FY10, the total passenger miles were 5,243,663,000 (for 23,889,000 passengers) while the same period for FY09, the miles were 4,858,792,000 (for 22,518,000 passengers). So the total passenger miles are up a bit more percentage wise than total passengers.

But a press release that says Amtrak has 6 something billion passenger miles is not a number that people can relate to. No, stick with total number of passengers and revenue. The important aspect for the FY10 numbers is that having record ridership and revenue help with the political narrative going into what will be a bumpier time in Congress. Flat or declining ridership numbers would not.

Now if we could divide pax mi by fuel used, we could say "Amtrak can carry 1 person xxxx mi on a single gallon of fuel" or for the electric trains "You can burn a light bulb one hour or you can go xx miles on Amtrak"

 

[dlagrua]

If you deduct international flights, the airlines move approximately 300 million passengers per year. At nearly 29 million passengers Amtrak is servicing 8-9% of the market but if we include the passenger numbers for the LD bus lines the Amtrak number could easily be 6-7%. The good news is that the number continues to grow and its going to be a difficult political argument to prove that the service isn't convenient, safe, energy efficient and in-demand.

 

[PRR 60]

If you deduct international flights, the airlines move approximately 300 million passengers per year. At nearly 29 million passengers Amtrak is servicing 8-9% of the market but if we include the passenger numbers for the LD bus lines the Amtrak number could easily be 6-7%. The good news is that the number continues to grow and its going to be a difficult political argument to prove that the service isn't convenient, safe, energy efficient and in-demand.

Domestic air in 2009: 618 million passengers

International passengers carried by USA carriers adds another 149 million.