‘Like eight Super Bowls’: World Cup events have doubled MARTA ridership
FIFA World Cup activities so far have generated more than half a million extra rail trips on MARTA, with ridership on the first four match days at least double the average, the transit agency says.
Between matches and the Fan Festival celebrations that have been held nearly every day since June 11, MARTA has tallied nearly 1.7 million total trips. Of those, 591,000 are credited to fans traveling to and from World Cup events.
Ridership on match days has exceeded MARTA’s projections, and travel during the rest of the tournament — which includes Friday’s match between the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Uzbekistan, and three more matches in Atlanta — is likely to be even higher.
The city also is hosting a semifinal match July 15.
“We’ve been stressing that this is a marathon, not a sprint,” interim General Manager and CEO Jonathan Hunt said last week in an update to a group of advisers.
Event organizers have described the monthlong FIFA World Cup’s impact in Atlanta as “like eight Super Bowls.” But ahead of the tournament, there were concerns about high ticket costs and U.S. immigration policies depressing attendance. Hotel and short-term rental bookings in Atlanta were all soft.
But for MARTA, ridership at the halfway point is beating the Super Bowl benchmark: Match-day ridership for every game so far has surpassed the 155,000 trips taken Feb. 3, 2019, when the Super Bowl was played at Mercedes-Benz Stadium.
MARTA ridership has been boosted by high match and Fan Fest attendance. There has been a full house at the past two matches, and attendance at Fan Fest has been higher than in any other U.S. host city, hitting maximum capacity multiple times.
The best day for MARTA was Wednesday, when Morocco played Haiti. MARTA tallied 220,000 rail trips that day, spokesperson Stephany Fisher said. That’s more than double typical Wednesday ridership.
Ridership on the two other weekday match days was slightly lower, with 180,000 trips on June 15 when Spain played Cape Verde and 190,000 on June 18 when Czechia and South Africa competed.
The June 21 match between Spain and Saudi Arabia saw the lowest ridership, with 160,000 trips taken. That’s three times a typical Sunday, however.
Ridership on Fan Fest-only days has ranged from 70,000 to 120,000.
Typical weekday rail ridership is 93,488, and typical weekend ridership is 54,027.
The ridership figures are estimates. MARTA’s fare gate installation project is ongoing, meaning not every station has fare gates where riders can tap in or out. To calculate ridership, MARTA counted taps at stations with the new fare gates and scaled up to systemwide totals using historical ridership patterns on comparable event days.
The ridership boost is a boon for MARTA, which has pulled out all the stops to meet the World Cup demands, including doubling train frequency on match and Fan Fest days. Hundreds of staff are serving as transit ambassadors to help riders navigate the system, and MARTA police are working extended hours.
At $2.50 a trip, MARTA’s fare is one of the best options of any host city, and the transit agency has encouraged fans to “let MARTA drive.” Still, a series of violent incidents in the weeks leading up to the tournament raised concerns.
MARTA’s safety and security plans for the tournament have gone well so far, Hunt said. There was one fight and an attempted robbery, with an arrest made in under an hour, he said. Rail service was also temporarily disrupted June 13 after a man was struck at the Civic Center Station.