In March, SEPTA’s bus, train and subway ridership was the highest it’s been since the pandemic started, writes Ryan Mulligan for Philadelphia Business Journal.

But revenue for the month is still short of SEPTA’s budget estimate.

There were just slightly over 15 million passenger rides in March, the highest in two years and a 33 percent increase over February. 

But it’s still only 51 percent of what it was in pre-pandemic March 2019.

SEPTA’s goal is to average 60 percent of its pre-pandemic passenger numbers, says Andrew Busch, director of SEPTA media relations. 

For the first three months of 2022, ridership is at about 48percent of what it was in the year leading up to the COVID-19 outbreak.

On the revenue side, SEPTA saw $22.7 million in passenger revenue, 24 percent below budget, but a 65 percent increase over what it was in March 2021. 

Federal COVID-19 relief funding supplementing SEPTA’s revenue expires in fiscal 2024.

By then, SEPTA hopes to have back 80% of its pre-pandemic ridership.

“Getting up to that 80 percent level would be helpful in sustaining us. That wouldn’t get us to 100 percent sustainability on our budget side — we’d still have to be careful how we’re spending money,” Busch said.

Read more at the Philadelphia Business Journal about SEPTA’s passenger and revenue numbers.