Transit Information Center
How do variations in operating funds expended affect service hours and ridership?
(1) Urbanized Area Size Definitions:- Large (population greater than or equal to 1,000,000)
- Medium (population greater than or equal to 200,000 and less than 1,000,000)
- Small (population less than 200,000 and greater than 50,000)
Data sources: Federal Transit Administration’s (FTA) National Transit Database (www.ntdprogram.gov)
InflationData.com > The Consumer Price Index > Historical CPI data (http://inflationdata.com/inflation/Inflation_Rate/HistoricalInflation.aspx
For this analysis we looked at 540 agencies and compared the annual variation in operating funds applied to the annual variation in service hours; and, the annual variation in service hours to the annual variation in unlinked trips for the period 2006 - 2007.
The variation rate was obtained through linear regression and the coefficients of determination (R square) are indicated in the table. (Coefficient of determination is a goodness of fit measure of a statistical model; the closer to 1 the better the goodness of fit.)
The data shows that that the variation rate for large urbanized areas is smaller than the rate for medium and small urbanized areas. For example:
In large areas, the total funds applied in 2006 were $300,000 and 5,000 service hours were produced, an increase of 10% in 2007 operating funds ($330,000) resulted in a service hours increase of 0.44 x 10% = 4.4%, or 5,022 service hours (1.0044 x 5,000). An increase of 4.4% in service hours should result in a nearly identical increase in unlinked trips as the rate of variation is close to 1.
In small areas, the same 10% increase in operating funds applied resulted in a larger increase in service hours ($330,000 produces 0.57 x 10% = 5.7% or 5,285 service hours). A 5.7% increase in service hours results in a 4.4% increase in trips (5.7% x 0.78) which is similar to the ridership increase in large areas.
For more information, contact the Transit Information Center (ticinfo@tspusa.com).