Ridership Statistics & Demographics

Ridership trends

• TriMet serves 575 square miles of the urban portions of the tri-county area, with a total population of 1.3 million.
• The agency recently set new ridership records: 91 million rides were taken on TriMet's MAX Light Rail and buses between July 2003 and June 2004. Ridership topped 300,000 daily weekday trips in April and May 2004.
• MAX carries about 97,000 trips each weekday—31 percent of TriMet's total daily trips.
• TriMet's bus lines carry nearly 210,000 trips per day.
• During the past five years, TriMet has increased the number of bus lines with 15-minute service seven days a week from four to 16. These lines cover 164 miles and carry more than half of all bus trips.
• Annual ridership has grown every year for the past 16 years.
• Since 1969, when TriMet was founded, nearly 1.8 billion rides have been taken on MAX and buses.

Customer profile

Who rides TriMet?

Forty-two percent of adults (age 16 and older) in the Portland region ride TriMet at least twice a month. That's up over one-third (35 percent) since 1997, the year before Westside MAX opened, extending the Blue Line its full distance from Gresham through downtown Portland to Hillsboro. 

Compared to non-riders, TriMet riders on average are likely to be younger, more likely to be students and single, and as a result, have a lower median household income.

Choice riders 

Most riders—77 percent—are "choice" riders: They have a car available or choose not to own one so they can ride TriMet.

Where they are going

Riders use the transit system for many different purposes. While 30 percent use the bus or MAX predominantly for getting to work, nearly one-quarter (22 percent) use it most often for recreation. Shopping trips are high on the list, followed by personal business, visiting friends or family, medical appointments and school.

Customers' choices: bus or MAX

More than half (53 percent) of TriMet riders use any combination of bus, MAX or Streetcar; 25 percent ride only MAX; 19 percent ride buses only; and three percent ride only the Portland Streetcar.

Customers who ride only MAX differ from those who ride only the bus or a combination of bus, MAX or Streetcar—both demographically and in terms of how they use the transit system.

MAX-only riders

MAX-only riders take an average of eight trips a month on MAX, most often for shopping (35 percent) and recreation (33 percent), and less often for work (17 percent). MAX-only riders are most likely to have a car available for their trip (76 percent), live in Washington county and have the highest median income and age ($64,000 annually and 40 years of age).

Bus-only and bus-and-rail riders

Bus-only and bus-and-rail riders take transit more often (21 trips per month on average) than those who ride only MAX. Thirty-three percent of these riders most often use transit for commuting to work, and less often for shopping and recreation. Bus-only and bus-and-rail riders are most likely to live in Multnomah County and more likely to depend on transit because they don't have a car available or can't drive. On average, bus-only riders are older (36 years) than bus-and-rail riders (34 years).

Riders approve of MAX

Nearly all TriMet riders (92 percent) in the Portland region strongly approve or somewhat approve of the MAX Blue Line, the light rail line from Hillsboro to Gresham. Also high on the approval list are the Red Line from Portland International Airport to Beaverton as well as the Yellow Line from the Portland Expo Center to the Rose Quarter (91 percent and 81 percent).

TriMet rates high with riders

TriMet riders give the agency high marks for job performance; 86 percent rated agency performance either "good" or "excellent."

Source: TriMet Attitude and Awareness Survey, November 2003, a random telephone survey of 1,000 residents in the TriMet service district.