A cable car on Hyde Street in 2022. Photo: Megan Rose Dickey/Axios
Cable car ridership has been slow to bounce back from the pandemic, having recovered just 58% of its 2019 ridership as of this February.
State of play: The cable cars shut down in March 2020 and didn't begin operating again until August 2021.
Since their return, cable cars have operated fewer hours and made fewer trips, the San Francisco Chronicle reports.
Why it matters: San Francisco's cable cars symbolize the city's tourism industry, which is slowly recovering.
By the numbers: In 2019, the city's cable cars saw between 430,000 to 480,000 passenger trips per month, according to the Chronicle's analysis of city data supplied to the Federal Transit Administration.
In February 2024, there were nearly 254,000 passenger trips.
Since the pandemic began, the highest cable car ridership was just short of 295,000 passenger trips in August 2023.
What's next: The San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency's board of directors this month approved a budget that includes $5 all-day passes for the California Street cable car line.
