Editor's Notebook: When Communicating Transit’s Value Becomes Agencies’ Top Challenge

Communicating transit’s value has been a steady drumbeat across the industry for several years. Emerging from the COVID-19 pandemic, this call to action urged us to find new ways to articulate the impact transit has on our communities amid a national decline in ridership.  

Each year, we poll our subscribers to create our annual Mobility Outlook. Since 2023, we’ve asked transit agencies which challenges they anticipate in the year ahead and which they believe will be the most pressing. Recruitment and retention took the top spot each year. In 2023, 89% of respondents said it would be a challenge and 51% identified it as their biggest concern. By comparison, just 37% said communicating transit’s value to local and/or state officials would be a challenge and only 12% ranked it as the top issue. 

This trend continued. In 2024, 31% agreed talking about transit’s value to officials would be a challenge and 18% thought it would be the biggest challenge. By 2025, 40% of agencies were saying this would be a challenge, but just a fraction—14%—indicated it was the most pressing issue.  

It wasn't until this year when we saw a turning point. Recruitment and retention was no longer the singular biggest challenge. Instead, a whopping 62% of agencies said communicating transit’s value would be a challenge and nearly 30% identified it as their most pressing obstacle. That’s over a 67% increase compared to 2023.   

So what gives? Transit agencies are still grappling with staffing challenges, but some may be seeing progress thanks to raising starting salaries and compensating training costs. Some agencies, like the Chicago Transit Authority (CTA), have reached pre-pandemic staffing levels. In October, CTA reported it surpassed pre-pandemic staffing levels for its bus and rail operators. According to its performance dashboard, as of December 2025, CTA employs more than 4,000 full-time bus operators and 880 rail operators. On the other hand, it’s possible recruitment has been placed on the back burner while agencies, such as TriMet, reduce staffing levels to address pending budget shortfalls. 

But why is communicating transit’s value to public officials especially difficult this year? I believe several factors are at play. First, the reauthorization of surface transportation funding is a big undertaking. A lot is at stake, and what’s decided by this Congress will have long-term implications for the industry. Succinctly telling a clear, compelling story about how funding decisions or new policies will affect transit can be challenging. 

We have a relatively junior Congress, particularly in the House. In the 118th Congress, 74 representatives were serving their first term. Establishing a meaningful relationship with your representatives takes time and introducing newbies to the full scope of what transit encompasses is no easy task.  

To add more complexity, it’s no secret the political landscape looks quite different today than it did in 2023. Some of our long-standing values used to traditionally communicate transit’s significance, like equity and sustainability, aren’t always as powerful in our current environment. So where does that leave us? I’d argue that we focus on access. Access gives people choice—more options on how we want to move, how we want to spend our money and where we live and work. Access to transit opens the door (pun intended) to opportunity: thriving economies, more livable communities and the freedom to choose how we move.  

So if you’re struggling to frame your story, remember this: transit affords everyone the ability to participate fully in daily life. That’s a story worth telling.