The Federal Transit Administration (FTA) Region VII honored Topeka Metropolitan Transit Authority (Metro) for increased ridership as part of the 2019 Midwest/South West Transit Conference.
The awards ceremony took place in Kansas City, Mo., Sept. 12 during the opening session of the conference.
Representatives with the FTA Region VII were on hand to honor public transit organizations from Arizona, Arkansas, Colorado, Kansas, Louisiana, New Mexico, Oklahoma and Texas (member states of South West Transit Association), in addition to Iowa, Nebraska and Missouri. Topeka Metro accepted the Award of Excellence for ridership increases among urban, small urban and rural public transit systems for the 2017-18 fiscal year.
The award recognized the highest increase in ridership among urban transit providers in Kansas, which was an increase of 16,202 for Topeka Metro.
“We are honored to have FTA recognize Topeka Metro. Our ridership has increased every year since 2016,” said Jim Ogle, Topeka Metro board chair. "We're contradicting the nationwide trend of low ridership. Topeka Metro has gone from 1.21 million rides in 2016 to 1.3 million in fiscal year 2019. This award from the FTA is for the fiscal year 2018, where we had a total of 1.27 million rides."
