Twin Cities Travel Behavior Inventory/Transit Onboard Pilot and Full Survey

The 2021 Travel Behavior Inventory/Transit Onboard Survey Pilot supported the development and analysis of the regional transit system in Minneapolis-St. Paul, Minnesota.

The primary purpose of the pilot survey was to evaluate the survey instrument (questionnaire) and gather information about bus and light-rail transit ridership during the COVID-19 era. At the time of the survey, many pandemic interventions were still in effect (municipal masking orders and closure of in-person offices) while others had been lifted (schools and universities had resumed in-person classes).

Following the pilot, the full survey conducted in 2022 encompassed bus, light rail, commuter rail, and commuter bus services. The results informed the update and validation of the Metropolitan Council’s new regional, tour-based travel demand model, enhancing the accuracy of transit forecasting and planning. Additionally, the survey provided insight into the travel behavior of current transit riders, supported before-and-after study reports for Federal Transit Administration Capital Investment Grant projects, and supplied data necessary for updated Title VI reporting.

Transit Agency

ETC Institute conducted the surveys for the Metropolitan Council.

Survey Methodology

2021

The pilot survey was conducted in English in Sept. 14–Nov. 20, 2021. It included two light-rail lines (METRO Green and Blue light rail) and the 10 busiest bus routes (METRO A and C bus rapid transit and local routes 2, 3, 5, 6, 10, 18, 19, and 21) in the Twin Cities region. Participants provided information about demographics, trip purpose, car access, and employment status.

2022

The full survey was conducted in English, Hmong, Somali, and Spanish from April to December 2022.

Survey Records, Data, and Documentation

Survey records include 35,304 participants, including 4,321 from 2021 and 30,983 from 2022.

Note, the zipped download file for the pilot study contains three datasets:

• On-to-off survey data – Includes boarding and alighting locations for a sample of trips; used for constructing stop-to-stop flows
• Origin-destination survey data – Includes detailed travel and demographic data from in-person questionnaires completed with a trained surveyor
• A 2016–2021 comparison dataset – Filtered to the routes in the 2021 pilot survey; only includes a selected set of columns for examining demographic and trip trends; to facilitate analysis, some survey response values were slightly adjusted to match across surveys.

How To Cite the Data

If you use TSDC data in a publication, please contact us and include a citation in your publication consistent with the following format:

"Transportation Secure Data Center." [(year)]. National Renewable Energy Laboratory. Accessed [date]: www.nrel.gov/tsdc.

More Studies and Surveys

See cleansed data from other transportation studies and surveys.