Abstract
This article examines pre-COVID declines in transit ridership, using Southern California as a case study. It first illustrates Southern California’s unique position in the transit landscape: it is a large transit market that demographically resembles a small one. It then draws on administrative data, travel diaries, rider surveys, accessibility indices, and Census microdata for Southern California, and demonstrates a strong association between rising private vehicle access, particularly among the populations most likely to ride transit, and falling transit use. Because the research cannot control quantitatively for the endogeneity between vehicle acquisition and transit use, the results are not causal. Nevertheless, the results strongly suggest that increasing private vehicle access helped depress transit ridership. Given Southern California’s similarity to most US transit markets, the conclusion is that vehicle access may have played a role in transit losses across the US since 2000.
