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<br />. <br /> <br />· An easy connection to the LRT service to the Airport and the Mall of America was <br />assumed to be in place. <br /> <br />Preliminary Ridership Forecasts <br /> <br />· The preliminary rail ridership forecast for the Year 2020 is presented in Figure 4 for <br />the downtown St. Cloud alternative and in Figure 5 for the City of Rice Station <br />alternative. With the proposed feeder bus system and connection to the LRT, the <br />proposed rail system is expected to attract more than 8,000 daily single trips (a round <br />trip from home to work and back to home is counted as 2 trips). The difference <br />between the two alternatives is less than 50 daily trips. <br /> <br />· Fifty six percent (56%) of these trips access the rail station by driving and parking at <br />the station of origin (commuter rail or feeder bus parking). <br /> <br />· The purpose of 87% of the rail trips is commuting to work. <br /> <br />· Reverse commute trips constitute only 3 percent of all the rail trips. <br /> <br />. <br /> <br />· The preliminary rail ridership forecast for the Year 2005 is presented in Figure 6 for <br />the downtown St. Cloud alternative and in Figure 7 for the City of Rice Station <br />alternative. Ridership for 2005 is estimated to be around 7,400 daily single trips <br />using the same operating assumptions as for 2020. Currently, the start up year for the <br />Northstar Commuter Rail system is the Year 2003. However, Year 2003 ridership <br />forecasts could not be produced since the official Metropolitan Council regional <br />model mid-year forecast is 2005. Therefore, Year 2005 ridership forecasts were <br />produced to represent the Northstar Commuter Rail system start up year of 2003. <br /> <br />· Based on current demographic projections, ridership is expected to grow by about <br />11.5 percent from 2005 to 2020. This corresponds to an annual growth rate of 0.7 <br />percent. <br /> <br />· Using an annualization factor of 291.44 (based on similar commuter rail systems in <br />the United States) the daily ridership correspond to approximately 2.1 million riders <br />in 2005 and 2.4 million riders in 2020. <br /> <br />. <br /> <br />Draft Commuter Rail Technical Feasibility Study <br />December 1998 <br /> <br />3-3 <br />Ridership <br />