Metro ridership grew in July, and these events helped make it happen

Ridership on the Los Angeles Metro transit system grew 8.2% in July compared to the same month last year, with a combined 25,466,384 bus and rail boardings, marking a 20th straight month of year-over-year progress, the agency announced Friday.

Events such as concerts, festivals and sporting events drove overall ridership, which resulted in an increase of weekday bus ridership by 7.37% and weekday rail ridership up by 2.62%. Venues with direct Metro rail access such as Expo Park off the E Line, LA Historic State Park off the A Line, and Dodger Stadium, through the Dodger Stadium Express bus from Union Station, saw ridership increases.

Other events that helped drive ridership were Gloria Molina Grand Park’s July 4th event, Anime Expo, KCON, and RuPaul’s DragCon, which took place downtown at the L.A. Convention Center and Crypto.com Arena, as well as sporting events.

Overall, the transit agency reported 19,873,436 weekday boardings, reaching 78.8% of its pre-pandemic July 2019 level. Meanwhile there were 5,592,948 boardings on the weekends in July, reaching 95.3% of pre-pandemic weekend ridership compared to July 2019.

Metro’s bus ridership data showed 19,676,497 rides taken in July, representing a 9.84% year-over-year ridership increase compared to the same period last year and reached 82.9% of its pre-pandemic levels. There were 2,069,496 boardings on Saturdays while another 2,151,275 boardings occurred on Sundays.

Rail boardings stood at 5,789,887, representing a gain of 3.23% over July 2023 ridership, and a 78.4% recovery of July 2019 rail ridership. Agency data showed 4,417,710 trips taken on the weekends.

The month of July marked the first full month of year-over-year comparison on the A and E lines — which were extended with the completion of the downtown Regional Connector project — showing ridership grew 16.76% over July 2023.

The busiest rail line in July was the B (Red) Line with 1,898,643 boardings, according to Metro.

Metro also touted ridership growth due to its fare programs such as the GoPass and Low-Income Fare is Easy programs, to help students and low-income customers, respectively.

GoPass-related boardings stood at 479,309, a 19% year-over-year increase over July 2023, which had 395,385 boardings. Additionally, the transit agency previously celebrated reaching more than 40 million student boardings, and more than 400,000 registered students using the program to travel to school, work and leisure activities.

Enrollment for LIFE is also up 12% year-over-year in July 2024 with 1,729,227 boardings compared to 1,541,755 in July 2023.