Introduction
The Washington Metro, otherwise known as Metro or Metrorail, is the primary public transit system for Washington, D.C. and surrounding Maryland and Virginia areas. The organization, Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority (WMATA), was founded in 1967, and has since overseen all Metro and Metrobus operations (Wmata.com, 2015). Today, Metrorail consists of six lines, 91 stations and over 117 miles of track. Deemed as the second-busiest transit system in the United States after the New York City Subway, Metrorail provided more than 215 million trips in this fiscal year alone (Siddiqui, 2015).
In June 2008, Metrorail set a ridership record with 19,729,641 trips and ridership continued to peaked in 2010 with over 740,000 passengers per weekday (Mullins & Gaynor, 2015). However, over the past few years, between 2010 and 2014, the Metrorail ridership has steadily declined by nearly 40,000 passengers per week, per year, making 2015 one of the organization’s worst fiscal years in history (Mullins & Gaynor, 2015). Figure 1
Reasons for the drop off in ridership vary by party, but several attributing factors seem to remain consistent across the board: an increase in mechanical breakdowns and accidents, and a decrease in the amount of trains that run …show more content…
In a transportation study done on customer satisfaction and safety of climate, researchers found that in units where there were more reported injuries and accidents, customers were less satisfied with the service they received and were more likely to find an alternative (Willis, Brown, Prussia, 2012). Fostering a sense of safety in riders is essential for Metrorail’s numbers to increase. It’s an innate behavior for people to avoid perceived threat and danger, and factors such as theft, lack of security officers, and rail malfunctions all contribute to this
The Washington Metro, otherwise known as Metro or Metrorail, is the primary public transit system for Washington, D.C. and surrounding Maryland and Virginia areas. The organization, Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority (WMATA), was founded in 1967, and has since overseen all Metro and Metrobus operations (Wmata.com, 2015). Today, Metrorail consists of six lines, 91 stations and over 117 miles of track. Deemed as the second-busiest transit system in the United States after the New York City Subway, Metrorail provided more than 215 million trips in this fiscal year alone (Siddiqui, 2015).
In June 2008, Metrorail set a ridership record with 19,729,641 trips and ridership continued to peaked in 2010 with over 740,000 passengers per weekday (Mullins & Gaynor, 2015). However, over the past few years, between 2010 and 2014, the Metrorail ridership has steadily declined by nearly 40,000 passengers per week, per year, making 2015 one of the organization’s worst fiscal years in history (Mullins & Gaynor, 2015). Figure 1
Reasons for the drop off in ridership vary by party, but several attributing factors seem to remain consistent across the board: an increase in mechanical breakdowns and accidents, and a decrease in the amount of trains that run …show more content…
In a transportation study done on customer satisfaction and safety of climate, researchers found that in units where there were more reported injuries and accidents, customers were less satisfied with the service they received and were more likely to find an alternative (Willis, Brown, Prussia, 2012). Fostering a sense of safety in riders is essential for Metrorail’s numbers to increase. It’s an innate behavior for people to avoid perceived threat and danger, and factors such as theft, lack of security officers, and rail malfunctions all contribute to this