Route 39 Arborway replacement bus has lost 3,000 daily riders since 1997

25 July 2005

The Route 39 bus, which replaced Arborway Green Line service from Back Bay to Forest Hills in Jamaica Plain, has suffered significant erosion in daily ridership since 1997. Yet, despite this loss and the State's commitment in 1991 to restore Arborway Green Line service, it has been reported that the Arborway project, which is currently under review by the Executive Office of Transportation (EOT) and the Department of Environmental Protection (DEP), will not be built and that bus service will become permanent. The bus ridership loss has apparently not yet been made public.

In a June 27, 2005 memo, Karl Quackenbush and Scott Peterson (CTPS) reported to Dennis DiZoglio and Joe Cosgrove (MBTA) that between 1997 and 2005, Route 39 daily bus ridership had fallen from 17,400 to 14,400, i.e., a 17% drop. This happened during the same period that ridership at the four Jamaica Plain stations on the Orange Line remained basically the same (23,590 in 1997; 23,027 in 2004).

The loss of 3,000 Route 39 daily riders represents both a significant loss of revenue for the T at a time when the transit authority can hardly afford it and a significant negative impact on air quality in greater Boston generally and in Jamaica Plain in particular, one of Boston's most densely populated environmental justice neighborhoods.

The original Arborway Study in 1987 had projected that the permanent operation of a Route 39 replacement bus service would result in a long-term loss of riders, although the loss in that study was projected to be only 2000 daily riders. It also projected that only by restoring Green Line service would ridership increase.

Under the Arborway transit regulation [310 CMR 7.36 (2)(d)], Arborway Green Line service was to have been restored on December 31, 1997. It was not restored then nor after the November 7, 2001 DEP order to do so. Yet, during the last eight years, the Route 39 bus has been losing riders at a notoriously high rate. Compounding the damage done by this ridership loss, MBTA managers have continued to affirm and reaffirm the position that bus service would not only retain, but also increase ridership. The hard reality of actual ridership numbers, however, stands in stark relief to the T's Route 39 bus ridership projections.