Transit On-Board Survey

2019 Transit On-Board Survey

ARC with MARTA and its partners completed the 2019 Regional Origin-Destination Transit On-Board Survey in December 2019, making it the last pre-pandemic transit rider survey in the US. With about 40,000 respondents (over 10 percent of the region’s transit ridership), it is one of the largest transit surveys of its kind in the United States.

The survey data collected provides current information on travel patterns and demographics for transit riders as well as service characteristics for metro Atlanta. The transit survey was administered to passengers on bus routes and rail lines operated by six transit systems: the Metropolitan Atlanta Rapid Transit Authority (MARTA), Cherokee Area Transportation System (CATS), Gwinnett County Transit, Hall Area Transit (Gainesville Connection), Cobb Transit Service (CobbLinc), and the State Road and Tollway Authority (SRTA).

The survey was conducted on all fixed routes and rail in ARC’s 20-county study area including the City of Atlanta and the counties of Clayton, Cherokee, Cobb, DeKalb, Douglas, Fayette, Fulton, Gwinnett, Henry, Rockdale, Barrow, Bartow, Carroll, Coweta, Forsyth, Hall, Newton, Paulding, Spalding, and Walton. Along with informing transportation plans and model updates at ARC, as well as other planning agencies and local governments throughout the Atlanta region, having extensive and recent data will make the region more competitive for federal transit funding.

Some of the information obtained includes origin, destination, demographics (including vehicle availability and household income), access and egress modes and public transit use, just to name a few. Riders were surveyed in a personal interview format, while leveraging tablet PC technology, hence facilitating highly accurate “on-the-fly” geo-coding. A database was developed to display data by selected categories (route, time-of-day, etc.) and by output type (queries, tables, etc.).

The survey documentation, including the final report and all appendices, are available below. Visualizations of the survey data results can be found on ARC’s ActivityViz (external link). The final datasets for the 2019 Transit On-board Survey are available by request through the Model Data Request form.

Survey FAQ (PDF, 61 KB)

2019 Survey Documents

• Survey Report (PDF, 7 MB)
• Executive Summary (PDF, 166 KB)
• Appendix A – Project Work Plan (PDF, 594 KB)
• Appendix B – Presentation (PDF, 4 MB)
• Appendix C – Questionnaire (PDF, 1 MB)
• Appendix D – Screenshots (PDF, 5 MB)
• Appendix E – Secondary Expansion Memo (PDF, 907 KB)
• Appendix F – Pilot Evaluation Report (PDF, 259 KB)
• Appendix G – Survey Management Plan (PDF, 190 KB)
• Appendix H – One Day Tour Diary Survey (PDF, 2 MB)
• Appendix I – QA/QC Plan (PDF, 3 MB)
• Appendix J – OD Survey Training Slides (PDF, 330 KB)
• Appendix K – On-to-Off Survey Training Slides (PDF, 1 MB)
• Appendix L – Interviewer Training and Deployment Plan (PDF, 188 KB)
• Appendix M – On-to-Off Sampling Plan (PDF, 916 KB) 
• Appendix N – Rail Sampling Plan (PDF, 336 KB) 
• Appendix O – Title VI Memo (PDF, 1 MB) 
• Appendix P – Linked Trip Decomp Analysis (PDF, 4 MB)
• Appendix Q – OBS Survey Processing Technical Memo (PDF, 3 MB)
• OBS Trip Assignment Technical Memo (PDF, 410 KB) 

The full 2019 survey and documentation can also be obtained here (external link) through the Transportation Secure Research Center.

2010 Transit On-Board Survey

ARC and its partners completed the 2009-2010 Regional On-Board Transit Survey (PDF, 5 MB)  in January 2010. With 50,000 respondents (approximately 10 percent of the region’s transit ridership), it is the largest survey of its kind in the United States.

The survey evaluated the travel patterns and demographics of riders living in 20 different counties and riding at various times of day on the region’s six transit operators:

• Cherokee Area Transportation System (CATS) (external link)
• Cobb Community Transit (CCT) (external link)
• Gwinnett County Transit (GCT) (external link)
• GRTA Xpress Bus (external link)
• Hall Area Transit (HAT) (external link)
• Metropolitan Atlanta Rapid Transit Authority (MARTA) (external link)

Along with informing transportation plans at ARC, other planning agencies and local governments throughout the Atlanta region, having extensive and recent data will make the region more competitive for federal transit funding when it becomes available. Some of the information obtained includes origin, destination, demographics (including vehicle availability and household income), access and egress modes and public transit use.

Riders were surveyed in a personal interview format with their responses. A database integrating ArcGIS and Microsoft Access was developed to display data by selected categories (route, time-of-day, etc.) and by output type (queries, tables, etc.).

2010 Survey Documents

• Survey Report (PDF, 5 MB)
• Executive Summary (PDF, 94 KB)
• Appendix A – Presentation (PDF, 3 MB)
• Appendix B – Survey Results (PDF, 656 KB)
• Appendix C – Survey Instruments (PDF, 141 KB)
• Appendix D – Screenshots (PDF, 5 MB)
• Appendix E – Data Dictionary (PDF, 505 KB)
• Appendix F – Rail Expansion Factors (PDF, 629 KB)
• Appendix G – Bus Expansion Factors (PDF, 3 MB)
• Appendix H – Interviewer Training Manual (PDF, 523 KB)
• Appendix I – Pilot Test Findings (PDF, 2 MB)
• Appendix J – GRTA Special Analysis (PDF, 277 KB)

For further information on the Regional On-Board Transit Survey, please contact us via e-mail at [email protected].