The Secret to Vancouver’s Public Transit Ridership Recovery
The Canadian city’s transit agency, TransLink, bounced back from Covid even as other North American systems have struggled. Its leader explains why riders returned.
TransLink buses on East Hastings street in Vancouver in 2024.
Photographer: Jennifer Gauthier/BloombergAcross North America, transit agencies have struggled to match the passenger counts they posted prior to Covid, in large part due to an enduring uptick in working from home. Some major systems, such as those in the Bay Area and Atlanta, are still moving only around half as many riders as they did before the pandemic struck. (In Europe and Asia, in contrast, some systems are hitting new ridership highs.)
By North American standards, Vancouver’s regional transit system, known as TransLink, is a success story, now moving around 90% as many people as in 2019. According to the American Public Transportation Association, TransLink has recovered ridership faster than almost any other major transit system on the continent (Washington, DC’s WMATA is another standout). Metro Vancouver recently pulled ahead of Toronto to post the second-most transit trips per capita in Canada, behind only Montreal.