Why Does Portland Have To Pay Over $3 Million Dollars To Give Area Students Bus Passes?

The first thing that suprises me about this program is that the City is having to pay alot of money to someone in order to let these students ride mass transportation for free.While I know that it costs money to print the passes etc it does seem a little off that the city has to pay more than $3 Million dollars.Check the data below and the article from The Oregonian to see if this makes sense to you Portland.

From The Oregonian Article

The program, which will cost more than $3 million, will be funded mainly with $800,000 from Portland Public Schools and about $2.5 million from the sale of business energy tax credits. Read The Article At The Oregonian

TriMet annual ridership figures reach new high

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101.5 million trips taken during FY2009

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For FY2009, a record 101.5 million trips were taken during the year, a 2.5 percent increase compared to FY2008. Annual trips by mode:  66.2 million trips on buses, 35.2 million on MAX and 125,000 on WES. Average weekday trips by mode: 215,300 bus trips, 107,800 MAX trips and 1,180 WES trips.

For the month of June, there were 8.4 million trips, down 4.3 percent from June 2008. Ridership is impacted by the recession, double-digit unemployment and lower gas prices that were at records levels last year. All ridership categories were down and figures below are compared to June 2008:

Bus, MAX & WES

• Weekly trips were 1,950,200, down 5.5 percent
• Weekday trips were 316,000, down 5.4 percent
• Weekend trips were 370,400, down 5.8 percent
• Rush hour trips were 96,200, down 9.3 percent

Bus

• Weekly bus trips were 1,223,400, down 5.8 percent
• Weekday bus trips were 203,300, down 5.8 percent
• Weekend bus trips were 206,900, down 6.1 percent
• Rush hour bus trips were 63,000, down 10.5 percent

MAX

• Weekly MAX trips were 721,000, down 5.6 percent
• Weekday MAX trips were 111,500, down 5.7 percent
• Weekend MAX trips were 163,500, down 5.5 percent
• Rush hour trips were 32,000, down 10.5 percent

WES (weekday rush hour service)

• Weekly WES trips totaled 5,800
• Weekday trips averaged 1,160 boardings.