A friend of the crackplog (but strong Red Line supporter) who I will not identify unless I receive permission, scouted out some fellow riders at Lakeline recently (while I was on Maui) and reported the following:
Riding train in today. Very informal raise your hand survey when I boarded at Lakeline. Abt 20% of folks boarding live in Austin.
Of the rest almost all live in Cedar Park.
Talking to small group already on train, a few from Leander, 1 Cedar Park, rest neither.
While merely anecdotal, this tends to support the theory from my earlier posts that most riders at Lakeline are likely not residents of the city of Austin. My original (educated guess) estimate was that 10% of the boardings at Lakeline would be Austin residents; the anecdotal observation was 20%. Not too far off; and nowhere near the claims of Red Line defenders that because the station is within city limits, most passengers must be from Austin.
Unfortunately, the city just decided to use tax funds from the city of Austin to further subsidize suburbanites who do not contribute tax dollars to the running of the system. My letter to city council got just one response, from the council member I would have least expected to reply. So it goes.
Earlier in this series:
