Ridership on San Diego trolleys tops 40 million; UTA sets all-time rail boarding record

In fiscal-year 2015, the number of trips taken on San Diego Metropolitan Transit System's (MTS) trolley routes surpassed 40 million for the first time ever.

Trolley ridership came in at 40,083,465, which reflected a 1 percent increase from 2014, when MTS logged 39,694,624 trolley rides, agency officials said in a news release.

The Blue Line was the agency's most used trolley route with 16,532,209 rides in FY2015. That marked a 9.5 percent year-over-year increase, MTS officials said.

Meanwhile, the Utah Transit Authority (UTA) set an all-time record of 567,892 rail boardings from Sept. 20 through Sept. 26. The agency attributed the increase to several community events, including the LDS Women's Conference and Comic Con.

To accommodate larger crowds, UTA added cars on its TRAX light-rail trains and increased service frequency.

The new record follows a trend of increased ridership this summer. Overall ridership for June, July and August increased over the same period in 2014, with more than 11.2 million rail and bus boardings taken over those months, UTA officials said.