Impacts of COVID-19 on public transport ridership in Sweden: Analysis of ticket validations, sales and passenger counts

Abstract

The paper analyses the impacts of COVID-19 on daily public transport ridership in the three most populated regions of Sweden (Stockholm, Västra Götaland and Skåne) during spring 2020. The analysis breaks down the overall ridership with respect to ticket types, youths and seniors, and transport modes based on ticket validations, sales and passenger counts data. By utilizing disaggregate ticket validation data with consistent card ids we further investigate to what extent fewer people travelled, or each person travelled less, during the pandemic. The decrease in public transport ridership (40%-60% across regions) was severe compared with other transport modes. Ridership was not restricted by service levels as supply generally remained unchanged throughout the period. The ridership reduction stems primarily from a lower number of active public transport travellers. Travellers switched from monthly period tickets to single tickets and travel funds, while the use and the sales of short period tickets, used predominantly by tourists, dropped to almost zero. One-year period tickets and school tickets increased from mid-April, which could indicate that the travellers using these tickets are particularly captive to the public transport system. Collaborative effort is required to put the results in the international context.

Keywords: COVID-19; Pandemic; Public transport; Sweden; Ticket validations; Urban mobility.

Fig. 1

Daily number of reported cases (bars) and cumulative number of reported cases per 100,000 inhabitants (lines) of COVID-19 for Stockholm, Västra Götaland and Skåne Regions.

Fig. 2

All regions, daily number of trips, relative change 2020 from the baseline 2019.

Fig. 3

Stockholm, realized daily number of departures for the metro (left) and buses (right).

Fig. 4

Left: Mobility activity at public transport stations. Source: Google COVID-19 Community Activity Reports (2020). Right: Public transport travel planner search activity. Source: Apple Mobility Trends (2020).

Fig. 5

Stockholm city, weekly relative change in bike flows (top left) and pedestrian flows (top left), daily number of motorized road vehicles (bottom).

Fig. 6

Daily relative change in number of trips from 2019 to 2020. Stockholm (left) and Västra Götaland (right).

Fig. 7

Stockholm, daily number of active cards and daily average number of trips per active card, in absolute numbers (left) and relative to the baseline (right). Bus trips are excluded.

Fig. 8

Stockholm, daily number of trips per ticket type in absolute values (left) and relative to the baseline (right), full fare tickets only. Bus trips are excluded.

Fig. 9

Västra Götaland, daily ticket sales amount in absolute numbers (left) and relative to the baseline (right), full fare tickets only.

Fig. 10

Stockholm, daily number of trips per ticket type in absolute values (left) and relative to the baseline (right), reduced fare tickets only. Bus trips are excluded.