Officials at MARC, Metro and Ride On report their passenger numbers keep growing as gas prices keep going up.
‘‘Thank you, Exxon, you’re gouging the American folks and so now they’re turning to public transportation,” said Jawauna M. Greene, a Maryland Transit Authority spokeswoman.
Ridership on MARC commuter trains is up significantly across the board, and officials say it’s related to the high price of gas, which reached $3.63 across suburban Maryland.
More people are parking their cars and taking public transportation because of high gasoline prices, said John Townsend II, AAA Mid-Atlantic’s manager of public and government affairs.
‘‘They’re not only taking public transit more, they’re cutting back in other ways on driving,” Townsend said, citing a recent AAA survey that showed 54 percent of Maryland drivers reported they were driving less. In the Washington region, which includes Montgomery and Prince George’s counties, 35 percent of motorists were cutting back on their driving.
‘‘You can expect $4 gas in the not-too-distant future, and that’s going to drive more people to mass transit,” Townsend said. ‘‘It’s good in several ways. We’re addicted to this thing called gas. It’s our great American birthright to drive and have cheap gas. It’s really more about budget than being environmentally conscious. These high gas prices are radioactive, like green kryptonite for motorists.”
MARC’s monthly snapshot of the number of passengers riding the commuter trains showed a large jump from February to March, the most recent figures available, Greene said.
The Brunswick line — which runs from Martinsburg, W.Va., through Frederick and Montgomery counties into Union Station in Washington — recorded 5,395 passengers on Feb. 13 when the state collected its monthly ridership data. On March 12, also a Wednesday, there were 8,153 passengers, a 51 percent spike.
‘‘It’s beyond everyone getting environmentally conscious and going green,” Greene said. ‘‘There’s nothing like losing green from your wallet.”
With some commuters spending $400 a month on gas, a monthly ridership pass on MARC from $120 to $200 looks like a bargain in comparison, she said.
‘‘It becomes less affordable for people to have that obsession with their cars. ... That’s not even taking into account parking or the wear and tear on your cars,” Greene said.
The trains are definitely getting more crowded, said MARC passenger David J. Uchic, who has taken the train from his home in Germantown to his job with the Paralyzed Veterans of America in Washington since 2002.
‘‘My concern is the system doesn’t have the resources to do the job,” Uchic said.
But MARC already anticipated greater ridership from the influx of military jobs over the next two years, Greene said. The state-sponsored commuter rail is planning to add more passenger cars pulled by newly remanufactured train engines that are more energy efficient and have greater pulling capacity, she said.
The high price of gas is a big reason why Josh Chambers, 34, of Germantown, began taking MARC more than a year ago to his information technology job with a health care company in Silver Spring, he said as he waited for his train Tuesday morning.
‘‘That drive eats up a lot of gas,” Chambers said. ‘‘It’s just more economical to take the train. It has been quite a bit more crowded these days.”
The other two commuter lines served by MARC have seen similar increases. The Penn Line had 18,228 passengers on Feb. 13 and 22,248 on March 12, a 22 percent increase. The Camden Line had 3,351 passengers on Feb. 13 and 4,489 on March 12, a 34 percent jump.
Other transit officials with Montgomery County’s Ride On and Metro said the bus and subway services have seen steady increases across the board.
Metro is on pace to set a record for carrying its most passengers in a single month. Of the 10 busiest weekdays ever recorded for Metrorail service, three have occurred this month, Metro spokesman Steven Taubenkibel said.
Through April 27, 17.4 million trips had been taken on Metro, compared with 16.3 million during the same period in 2007, Taubenkibel said. Part of that is because of special events this month, such as sporting events and the visit by Pope Benedict XVI.
‘‘A lot of people are looking at the mass transit option now,” Taubenkibel said.
Ride On has had 46 consecutive months of ridership growth, Ride On spokesman Thomas Pogue said.
The first nine months of the current fiscal year has seen more than a 5 percent increase in passengers on Ride On, Pogue said.
The bus service averages more than 93,900 trips daily. Some of the increase could be due to other factors, such as people concerned about the environment and more immigrants moving into the community, Pogue said. Ride On has not surveyed passengers recently to find out why more people are taking the bus.
‘‘But we think the price of gas going up would be a big part of it,” he said.
Irregular prices for regular
Current - $3.634
Yesterday - $3.624
Month Ago - $3.299
Year Ago - $2.979
Source: AAA Mid Atlantic
