The infographic above is a visualization of the most common responses to the question, “Why do you drive?” in our Why You Don’t Ride survey.

It really came down to two things for survey respondents: convenience and speed.

Despite the recent report that L.A. has the worst traffic in the U.S., those who choose to drive do it for the speed. Long commutes are often made longer by buses that have to make many stops or when a rider must transfer, and the convenience of being able to set their own schedule rather than adhering to a transit schedule is attractive to many drivers.

Here’s what one respondent, John from Monrovia, had to say about the issue:

“Why would I sacrifice speed and flexibility just to use Metro?  It should be one or the other.  Driving should be more flexible, and rail should be faster.  Since buses compete on the same grid as cars, they’re doomed to fail on both counts.”

Other common responses included: ease of use, reliability, safety and the fact that some just had no other choice. Safety is an interesting answer considering that over 30,000 Americans are killed each year in car accidents – but most of the answers in the survey were referring to the perception of safety in and around transit stops, especially late at night.

Why should Metro care about why people choose to drive? If increasing ridership is a goal, it’s important to know what the competition has to offer. How can Metro compete with the car – especially in terms of convenience and speed? Feel free to share your thoughts in the comments.

Here are our selections this week:

• Stephen, East L.A. – Why You Ride
  “Save money, help the environment, reduce stress, enjoy meeting fellow riders.”
• James H. Lampert, Orange County – Why You Ride
  “It beats driving. I can read, rest, and look at the scenery on the way.”
• Steve L, Arcadia – Why You Don’t Ride
  “Much too slow taking the bus – with missed connections the trip can take up to 90 minutes to go just 11 miles – Ugh!”

Read the surveys, after the jump. Continue reading →

The above infographic displays a word cloud of answers pulled from the following question on our Why You Ride survey: “If you could make one change to improve your transit experience, what would it be?”

While readers expressed a multitude of opinions, a few ideas popped up again and again: more frequent service, expanded late night service, free transfers, access to real time arrival information and an improved TAP card with stored-value.

The good news is that a few of these issues are actively being addressed – TAP cards are moving towards full stored-value implementation and Next Bus is on its way (stay tuned for an update).

Not quite as pressing, but worth mentioning: a few riders would like a better smelling ride more than anything else.

Here are our selections this week:

• Bert Green, Downtown L.A. – Why You Ride
  “Car free by choice, Metro is a good option for many of my needs.“
• Tobias, USC – Why You Ride
  “I don’t have any other options, but even if I did, transit makes it so I don’t have to deal with traffic, especially the nightmare that is Bowl traffic.“
• JJ, Rancho Cucamonga – Why You Don’t Ride
  “My hours don’t allow me to take Metrolink and Metro. Metrolink does not have the hours to connect me to Metro in time to start my shift,and there isn’t any transportation available at that time of the morning.“

Read the surveys, after the jump. Continue reading →

Last August we embarked on a little experiment – we decided to open up the blog to our readers and give them the chance to tell us why they ride transit. We didn’t stop there though, we also decided to ask those who don’t ride to tell us why.

The response was overwhelming, we received 325 completed surveys (227 “Why You Ride”, 98 “Why You Don’t Ride”), many of them going into detail about what keeps them on or off transit and what they’d like to see Metro do to improve transit in L.A. County.

We started publishing the results immediately, allowing other readers (including Metro staff) to see how their fellow Angelenos felt about L.A.’s growing transit system. We posted 48 surveys to the blog last year and they often sparked good discussion on the comments board, but some felt the daily postings were becoming a little overwhelming (including Streetsblog L.A., who still awarded us with 2010 Streetsie Award for best news site despite the frequent postings).

This doesn’t mean we’re done publishing the surveys – but to turn down the daily noise we’ll be posting a selection of them in a single post every Thursday from now on.

Also, we’ve closed the survey so that we can collect the data and analyze the results. We’ve actually got some bigger plans once we’ve compiled all the data, so stay tuned.

Here are our selections this week:

• Beth Pineles, Venice – Why You Ride
  “Save money, help environment, no other option, reduce stress, drinking alcohol”
• Nicholas, Studio City – Why You Ride
  “Reduce stress, save money, help environment, so I can have dinner with my wife and ride home in the same car as her.”
• Jamie, Santa Monica – Why You Don’t Ride
  “It’s fast, convenient, and cheaper than public transportation.”

Read the surveys, after the jump. Continue reading →