(The following article by Phil Pitchford was posted on the Press-Enterprise website on October 17.)
RIVERSIDE, Calif. — Bob Todd sees every morning what Metrolink’s statistics are just starting to document — more people are riding the commuter railroad to avoid freeway traffic and high gas prices.
Todd boards the train at the La Sierra station in Riverside and takes the Inland Empire-Orange County line to his job as an engineer in Irvine. Ridership on the line has risen about 9 percent during the last year, with 227 more people using the train in August 2005 than did in August 2004, bringing monthly total to 3,781, according to the Riverside County Transportation Commission.
“If you get on at Orange in the morning, you might not get a seat some days,” the Riverside resident said. “And if you get on at Anaheim Canyon coming home, you very likely won’t, because it’s so crowded.
The same ridership growth trend exists on two of three other Metrolink lines that get Inland commuters into Los Angeles and Orange counties, according to the Riverside County Transportation Commission.
Ridership on the 91 Line from San Bernardino through Riverside and Orange counties to Union Station in Los Angeles has risen about 8 percent. The San Bernardino Line from that city through San Bernardino County to Union Station is up 9 percent.
“The overall increase does not surprise me,” said John Standiford, spokesman for the Riverside County Transportation Commission. “If you go to our stations, parking is getting tight, especially in Corona.”
The same sharp growth in ridership occurred a couple of years ago, when people routinely rode on the stairs of the train before Metrolink added another train car to the line, Todd said. The line starts in San Bernardino and makes eight stops in Orange County before ending in Oceanside.
“It opened up and got a lot more comfortable, but now it’s getting crowded again,” Todd said.
Only the system’s Riverside line refuses to show similar improvement. Ridership is down on that line about 8 percent compared to last year, due to severe delays from mid-January to mid-April that resulted from scheduling conflicts with Union Pacific freight trains that share the line.
Improved dispatching by Union Pacific caused dramatic improvements in late July and August, according to statistics from the transportation commission. While on-time performance sank to 71 percent in April, well below the target of 95 percent, the number jumped to 99 percent in August.
That poor performance along the Riverside Line earlier this year could have something to do with increases along the 91 Line, Standiford said. Both lines end at Union Station in Los Angeles, and some riders of the oft-delayed Riverside Line likely migrated over to the 91 Line, he said.
“If word gets out that this is a reliable way to go, people will come back to the Riverside line,” he said.
Growth in Metrolink usage, and the belief that such growth will continue, is driving the construction of a new, 1,000-space parking garage at the North Main station in Corona. The $26 million garage, Metrolink’s first in Riverside County, will complement the existing parking lot, which has only about 580 spaces.
That existing lot was nearly full when the station was opened. It now overflows with cars, more than 100 of which are parked on surrounding streets each day. A parking lot expansion also is planned at the downtown Riverside station, although that will not be a parking garage.
Todd, the passenger from Riverside, said some train riders in Corona park in a lot owned by a nearby lumber yard, and risk getting towed as a result.
“North Main has seriously parking problems,” he said.