Second BRT to be built within next five years, District 8 Alder MGR says

by Patricia Clark

January 30, 2025

Mia Homan

The 80 bus parked outside of Memorial Union. January 30, 2024.

Metro Transit ridership has significantly increased since the release of the Bus Rapid Transit.

The system showed a 10% increase in overall ridership and an 18% increase in ridership on the Rapid A Route in November and December of 2024 compared to the previous year, according to preliminary data released Wednesday.

District 8 Alder MGR Govindarajan said increased ridership is a result of improved public transportation systems.

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“The thing we see across the country is the easier you can make it to take public transit and the safer you can make it, the more people will take it,” MGR said.

The new BRT running along Metro Rapid Route A started running August of 2024, according to previous reporting by The Badger Herald.

While the new BRT is the main contributor to the large increase in ridership, there are other variables that factor into the system’s success, MGR said.

“It’s smaller things where it’s much easier to take the buses than it was about a year ago,” MGR said. “Instead of playing around with a flimsy card to swipe on the bus, now you just have the tap cards that you can reload online, or students get them for free.”

Demand for efficient public transportation calls for more BRT lines being built. The City of Madison will have an estimated population of 80,000 by the end of 2050, MGR said.

Implementation of this new bus system was made possible by funding from a $118.1 million budget proposed in March of 2024 under the Biden Administration for the Madison area’s BTR for 2025, according to previous reporting by The Badger Herald. 

During the fall of 2024, Metro Transit made changes to their bus systems by implementing fare collection, meaning some data has not been accounted for and official numbers will be complete by mid-2025, according to the City of Madison’s website.

To help accommodate the large increase in population, the city is planning to build another BRT that runs from north to south in 2027 or 2028 depending on funding, MGR said.

https://badgerherald.com/news/madison/2025/01/30/madisons-metro-transit-shows-increase-in-ridership-since-rapid-transit-update/