Streetcar ridership continues to plummet to better-than-projected numbers Matt Wild November 6, 2019 Milwaukee’s forever controversial streetcar system, The Hop, celebrated its first birthday last week. Happy birthday, The Hop! Even better, it was announced that Cleveland-based technology firm Everstream would be plunking down $90,000 to sponsor a “holiday-themed” streetcar and keep the entire system free throughout the holidays. Thanks, Everstream! But a very important and increasingly tiresome question remained: HOW MANY PEOPLE RODE THE STREETCAR IN OCTOBER AND HOW QUICKLY CAN WE SCRAP THE WHOLE THING IF IT WASN’T A MILLION AND HAHA HOW ARE YOU GOING TO PAY FOR THIS THING AND THE HOP IS FLOP AND THE HOP IS A BOONDOGGLE AND FARTFARTFARTFART SEND. Turns out, 62,010 people rode The Hop in October 2019. That’s an average of about 2,000 rides per day. A 2011 study projected 1,800 rides per day. Two-thousand is more than 1,800. BUT STILL. October 2019 is down from September 2019 (66,986 total rides), which itself was down from August 2019 (80,113 total rides), which in turn was down from a record-setting July 2019 (103,625 total rides). We’re no scientists, but perhaps summer weather and festival season might play a part in streetcar ridership. WEIRD. As for the HOW ARE YOU GOING TO PAY FOR THIS THING AND WHAT HAPPENS WHEN IT’S NOT FREE question, here’s some handy info from Urban Milwaukee: According to the city’s budget, The Hop’s 2019 operation will be funded by a federal grant for operations ($3,457,754), the 12-year, $10 million Potawatomi Hotel & Casino sponsorship ($691,670) and other advertising deals ($250,000). Fare equipment, for which $400,000 remains set aside from the project’s $128 million capital budget, has not been purchased. As part of the deal to bring the Democratic National Convention to Milwaukee, the system must be free while the convention is in town. The whole expansion thing remains a mess. Anyway, here are the numbers so far. Happy winter, Milwaukee. NOVEMBER 2018 Total rides: 80,361 Average daily ridership: (excluding opening weekend): 2,459 DECEMBER 2018 Total rides: 76,131 Average daily ridership: 2,456 JANUARY 2019 Total rides: 48,354 Average daily ridership: 1,560 FEBRUARY 2019 (estimated, due to missing data) Total rides: 45,000 Average daily ridership: 1,607 MARCH 2019 (estimated, due to missing data) Total rides: 50,000 Average daily ridership: 1,613 APRIL 2019 Total rides: 55,657 Average daily ridership: 1,855 MAY 2019 Total rides: 62,937 Average daily ridership: 2,030 JUNE 2019 Total rides: 71,367 Average daily ridership: 2,379 JULY 2019 Total rides: 103,625 Average daily ridership: 3,343 AUGUST 2019 Total rides: 80,113 Average daily ridership: 2,584 SEPTEMBER 2019 Total rides: 66,986 Average daily ridership: 2,233 OCTOBER 2019 Total rides: 62,010 Average daily ridership: 2,000