Americans take more than 10 billion trips on public transportation for first time in almost 50 years
April 2007
The American Public Transportation Association (APTA) reports that Americans took 10.1 billion transit trips in 2006, the most in 49 years. That was up 2.9 percent over 2005, and up 30 percent since 1995. Transit ridership over the past 10 years has grown more than twice as fast as population (up 12 percent), and even faster than travel by private cars and trucks (up 24 percent). For perspective, last year’s 10.1 billion transit trips outnumbered domestic airline trips by 15 to one.