Ridership on Norfolk's light rail is exceeding expectations

NORFOLK

It takes Bobby Parks an extra 20 minutes to commute to work and an extra $50 for a monthly pass to ride The Tide. Still, he's hooked.

"To me, not having to drive (Interstate) 264 is worth it," he said. "It makes me cringe with the potholes and bumps. ... Light rail is less stressful and, with traffic, it's more consistent."

Parks drives four miles from his Virginia Beach home to the Newtown Road Station, rides the train to the MacArthur Square Station, and walks a couple blocks to work at Dominion Enterprises. He figures his savings on gas plus wear and tear on his car, and his nerves, is worth more than the train fare.

Parks is among a few thousand people who ride daily - far more than what transit officials expected.

With a full calendar month of collecting fares, The Tide is averaging 5,056 daily weekday trips. Hampton Roads Transit projected that 2,900 trips would be taken each weekday the year the rail opens, and 7,130 daily rides by 2030.

Counting weekends (The Tide runs a shortened schedule on Sundays), average daily ridership has been nearly 4,870.

But will the big numbers hold?

Ridership on the newest light-rail systems in Phoenix; Charlotte, N.C.; Houston; and Seattle grew after launching. Phoenix Metro started with daily weekday ridership in the low 30,000s and two years later was in the low 40,000s.

"Our original assumption was that, at some point, we'd level out to what our normal ridership should be, but instead we continue to see growth," said Hillary Foose, a Metro spokeswoman.

Charlotte's LYNX went from 11,500 boardings a day to 15,300 in its first year. Houston's ridership doubled the first year and now is posting 36,000 daily trips, triple 2004's opening months. Seattle's system has grown from 15,000 daily trips to 25,000 in two years.

Federal Transit Administration officials have told HRT that it takes about six months for ridership on light-rail startups to normalize.

"What we're seeing now is a base of ridership building," HRT president and CEO Philip Shucet said. "My hunch is that the base will not erode but will stabilize or begin to grow."

With just more than a month of ridership data, it's clear that the Newtown Road end-of-the-line station is the most popular - about one out of every four Tide customers begins or ends their trips there.

The next-busiest stop is the MacArthur Square Station, which is used by nearly 18 percent of riders. It's followed by the other end-of-the-line station at Fort Norfolk/EVMC, used by just more than 13 percent of customers.

"It seems from riding and talking to passengers and looking at the numbers, we rather quickly settled into a pattern of supporting commuter trips," Shucet said. "And judging from the activity at the MacArthur station, we're also serving downtown retail."

Chesapeake resident Melba Brown said she and her two girls are among the customers who use light rail to shop and eat downtown "for the adventure."

"It's really fun," said Amariah Brown, 9, of her Tide ride. "I like when it starts going fast like a roller coaster."

For some commuters like Joe Rice, riding The Tide was "too convenient not to try." The Virginia Beach resident says he rode on opening day, and every workday since, to get to his job at Bank of America.

Laura Gwathmey's husband drops her off at the Fort Norfolk station about three days a week to ride to her job downtown with Physicians for Peace. In the afternoons, she walks close to a mile from the station to her West Ghent home.

"We need to make a point to use it so we can get it extended," she said.

One of the biggest cheerleaders for an extension into Virginia Beach is Gwathmey's husband, who works at Town Center.

"He is so jealous," she said.

Debbie Messina, (757) 446-2588, debbie.messina@pilotonline.com