Got the 2020/2021 CATA Community Report in the mail yesterday. Apparently, between October '19 to early March '20, CATA was on track to post record annual ridership. The initial COVID hit in March cut ridership 69% over February, and 60% compared to March 2019. Service didn't fully return until May 26. CATA ended FY 2020 at around 7.3 million rides, a drop from 11 million the previous fiscal year. FY 2021 showed a crash; ridership finished at only 1.9 million rides, similar to the ridership during the starting years of the authority in the 1970's. Though apparently this fiscal year is showing signs of life.
CATA has started their on campus service and East Lansing connecting routes again, and already have many more riders then I have seen since I moved here in May. With the students and employees of MSU back in town I'm sure the ridership numbers will grow.
Yes, they mentioned the return of campus service. Still, the heart of the system is Lansing riders, and I'll be interested to see how many years it's going to take for us to recover.
In tonight's city council packet an ordinance for a noise waver for the reconstruction of 496, next year, between the Grand River and Lansing Road (i.e. the downtown section of the freeway). What I was not aware of is that they are adding auxillary lanes between the MLK and Lansing Road ramps. This should make merging much, much safer along this part of the freeway. This is one of the projects made possible by the gov's Rebuilding Michigan road plan, BTW.
Great to hear about those extra lanes there. Now if we could make 127 three lanes from 96 to Lake Lansing and do something better with the 496 interchange I'd be quite happy with our freeways.
I took a drive over the rebuilt Aurelius Road bridge the other day, it was so nice to see the new smooth pavement. I found that I was still looking for potholes as I crossed, wow it's about time, I am glad they got to it. Then I went down Forest Road to check out the new hospital and traffic roundabout. The hospital building is beautiful and impressive, it must be the largest building complex built in Lansing for some time. The rotary was nice too!
I'm sure this will help boost CATA's bottom line but I'm not sure loading the busses with high schoolers is going to encourage workers to commute on those routes. I guess given the dearth of office workers this will probably be a net positive.
The I-496 project has finished and although I have not been down that way myself the LSJ says the highway has reponed. I will have to check it out form my trip to Horrocks.
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I'm sure this will help boost CATA's bottom line but I'm not sure loading the busses with high schoolers is going to encourage workers to commute on those routes. I guess given the dearth of office workers this will probably be a net positive.