Public Transport Volumes

Source: National Transport Authority

The number of passenger journeys on public transport has dropped dramatically since the start of the COVID-19 crisis. Since the start of this year public transport journeys have been increasing gradually but public transport journeys remain below pre-pandemic levels as onboard public service capacity continues operating at reduced levels (note that on Monday 19^th July the onboard capacity on public transport increased from 50% to 75%).

Data relating to bus and rail journeys is presented in table 3.1 and figure 3.1. The latest data shows that for the week commencing 25 July, the total number of rail and bus journeys is 51.2% of those taken in early March 2020 (pre COVID-19). The number of bus journeys outside of Dublin in the same week is 57.9% of pre COVID-19 levels. The corresponding level for bus journeys within Dublin is 51.0% of pre-COVID levels.

The data indicates that rail was the mode of transport that was most severely hit since the onset of the crisis. In the week commencing 05 April 2020 the number of journeys undertaken by rail was 97.2% lower than it was in the first week of March of 2020. For the latest week under consideration (week commencing 25 July) the number of journeys by rail was 53.9% lower than pre COVID-19 levels. Please note that rail data includes passenger journeys on Intercity and DART services.

Data on Luas journeys taken is presented in table 3.2 and illustrated in figure 3.2. Latest data for week 30 shows that journeys increased by 31.8% on the red line when compared with week 30 in 2020 but are still 57.0% lower than the same week in 2019.

For the green line in the same week, data shows that journeys have increased by 43,060 journeys compared with the corresponding period in 2020 but are still 58.5% lower than the same period in 2019.  This is to be expected as onboard public service capacity remains operating at reduced capacity.