Phoenix ridership increases

Phoenix Valley Metro has reported a 4% increase in bus ridership when comparing boardings from 2004 to 2005.

In the past 12 months, there have been 56.4 million bus boardings for the entire Valley Metro system. For the same time period in 2004, there were 54 million measured.

Contributing to the overall increase are the express bus and Phoenix RAPID services, which have increased ridership by 23%. Additionally, the number of bike-on-bus boardings also continues to rise, placing the Valley Metro system near the top in the nation for carrying bicycles.

In 2005, there were about 1.2 million bike-on-bus boardings, up from 748,124 in 2001.