(Pre-Covid) - Why does Pittsburgh's light rail system have such low ridership?

[OyCrumbler]

Originally Posted by Independentthinking83

Because it’s a trolley line and not truly light rail. It runs slower than light rail. Pittsburgh’s rail lines are trolley gauge. Even Cleveland RTA cars a bigger and won’t run on our lines. Their lines along with pretty much every major city are standard gauge. Only Pittsburgh, New Orleans and one line in Philly is the last trolley gauge lines left. The Pittsburgh cars were purchased in 1985 and refurbished a few times over the years. It’s an old dated system and it’s electrics are dated and costly to maintain. It’s a money pit that will be likely mothballed in the next years. In favor of buses.

And the reason they are refurbished over and over is because no rail lines are trolley gauge anymore. Pittsburgh can swap rail transit cars with New Orleans and that’s it. They run the old wooden vehicles.

And sorry Cincinnati has one trolley line still in service above ground through their downtown. That’s it

Pennsylvania Trolley Gauge is a broad gauge and is substantially *wider* than standard gauge. If you're thinking of the width of the actual cars, that's essentially the loading gauge and is only tangentially related to the Pennsylvania Trolley Gauge which is a track gauge. The heavy rail rapid transit Market-Frankford Line in Philadelphia also uses Pennsylvania Trolley Gauge (and is positively trucking it compared to the T) along with Philadelphia's light rail / streetcar lines, as does the New Orleans streetcar. Depending on the rolling stock, existing rolling stock from standard gauge can be adapted though it would probably make sense for either 1) replacing with standard gauge if you've got that kind of money and if the system was looking at massive expansion or 2) placing joint orders with the other lines for rolling stock that uses Pennsylvania Trolley Gauge.

Light rail can run a gamut and it really depends on if it runs in mixed-traffic (shared lanes), if it has grade separation (runs in its own lanes separate from traffic), and if so, for what portion of the tracks, and if it stops at traffic lights, and if so, if it gets signal priority. I know that outside of the underground portions, the T generally runs at-grade. It doesn't look like the T has signal priority. I also found this link from 2011 explaining its slow speed: https://www.post-gazette.com/opinion...s/201104240167 Does anyone know if any of this op-ed's cited recommendations for speeding things up have actually come to past? Is there signal priority in parts or whole now? Are there faster operating speeds at certain points than before? Have any of the intermediate, lower-ridership stops been eliminated? Updated signaling and operations so that there aren't stops outside of stations and streetlights? Track replacement for former slow zones due to dilapidated tracks?

If the T gets sped up, like with the points mentioned in that op-ed, then that means the same amount of rolling stock and operating hours can cover substantially more runs for about the same cost, and meanwhile, the greater frequency and shorter times to get to destinations would supposedly have a salubrious effect on ridership. It would seem like a no-brainer to go for what are fairly low-hanging fruits to speed things up.

Aside from the slow speed and somewhat low service frequency (which can be upped a bit without blowing up costs with improved speeds), there's also the fact that it doesn't serve other parts of the city outside the south suburbs, downtown, and the stadiums--most notably it doesn't serve the rather large secondary business district and college town of Oakland. It also doesn't serve the airport and the main intercity rail station (there is single track rail and a station there, but it gets no regular service which is just as well since there are few intercity trains that pass through Pittsburgh during normal hours). Those are all higher hanging fruit to tackle though than speeding up what's already there.

[SteelCityRising]

I park for free in Manchester daily and then walk a half-mile to the Allegheny T Station. I then take that to my office next to the 1st Avenue T Station. I find the train to be quite enjoyable and efficient. It also beats paying $13/day to park Downtown!

[eschaton]

Originally Posted by zalewskimm

Don't forget Beechview. But the Blue Line goes out to the South Hills Village and I think Library?

It does go through Beechview, but that neighborhood is not particularly dense. Certainly less dense than Dormont or Uptown Mt. Lebanon.

The Blue Line is incredibly inconvenient to everywhere around it. Instead of going through neighborhoods, it skirts past them down in a ravine. There's absolutely no high-density areas within walking distance of any of the stations. The

[szug-bot]

pre-covid, it was pretty busy getting people out to the last north side stop. it serves the communities in that area well, as well as doubling for access to the casino and the stadiaa. it is marvelous in that regard.

i used to depend on it while living in beechview, and that and the hellacious driving to get down the West Liberty suicide dragstrip through the tunnels to civilization was just not worth if for living in the city.

too bad - beechview was overall quite nice...and for someone whose routine is south hills centered, great. but we are talking about the T here - it was not that pleasant for daily morning commutes to downtown.

[_Buster]

Originally Posted by qwerty01

I concur that pre-covid T ridership was completely packed\overcrowded per train during M-F rush hour. Otherwise, only a few trains after a big sports game or concert were loaded. I don't necessarily think this is a bad thing by the way.

Also, by my understanding the T ridership numbers only include paying riders. This is a huge distinction because there is a large fare-free zone downtown where people get on and off without (legally) paying. In addition, I have experienced a quite substantial amount of riders not paying even whenever they should. This is because if you get on downtown you are expected to pay whenever you EXIT the train in the south hills. I've seen a lot of people just hop off without paying (illegally) even whenever toll booth station workers aren't present.

Lastly, I am firmly in the camp that the T should be expanded. Most people on here will debate (with valid points) the drawbacks of light rail, but there are positives that should not be dismissed as well. It seems as if most people only focus on the negatives on this forum in my experience.

Yes, I was wondering about this years ago, and I asked PAT. they do not count the free riders in the free fare zone. there is no way to possibly do it, because there are no turnstyles. counts are only paying customers. which probably means the real T ridership numbers are almost double the published numbers.

[OyCrumbler]

Originally Posted by _Buster

Yes, I was wondering about this years ago, and I asked PAT. they do not count the free riders in the free fare zone. there is no way to possibly do it, because there are no turnstyles. counts are only paying customers. which probably means the real T ridership numbers are almost double the published numbers.

Oh, that really changes things. Those fareless six stations on the North Shore and in downtown probably make up a very large number of trips especially with the downtown population bump and stadium events. They could use sensors at the doors of the rolling stock or do a more manual count for a specified period as a basis for projections--surely they do something like this sometimes, right? It would seem like a somewhat reliable passenger count would be crucial in terms of applying for funding or applications for capital expenditure funding. The most bone-headed thing that can possibly happen is PAAC using inaccurately low numbers in applying for funding, but that'd be an unbelievable oversight and definitely not happening, right? If anyone on this board is involved with PAAC, can they, uh, just do a quick check to make sure something that mind-numbing isn't happening?

[Joe_P]

i would say that it's unique being a subway downtown, but then ultimately a trolley, which can be tedious.