MTA Daily Ridership

1 Introduction

Explain why you chose this topic, and the questions you are interested in studying. Provide context for readers who are not familiar with the topic.

As two individuals who recently moved to New York City, we decided to choose a dataset that related to the MTA which primarily resides in New York City. Our team intends to leverage the MTA’s daily ridership data to derive actionable insights that could enhance the New York City transit system. The Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA) is a vital agency responsible for operating public transportation in New York City, including subways, buses, commuter rail, and paratransit services. The daily ridership dataset, commencing on March 1, 2020, offers granular information on system-wide ridership and traffic patterns across various modes of transportation including the Staten Island Railway, buses, Long Island Rail Road, Metro-North Railroad, Access-A-Ride, and Bridges and Tunnels.

We aim to analyze these data to understand the MTA’s operational dynamics over time, assess ridership frequency and volume, compare pre- and post-pandemic usage, and identify emerging trends in passenger behavior.We believe these areas of focus would be able to paint a vivid picture of New York City’s past and present behaviors as well as providing some insights on areas of improvements and or decline. With data we will be able to answer the question of where the MTA should focus their resources and policies to optimize ridership accessibility, ride time and rider capacity in the long term.