FAX ridership is up in the first half of 2025 — and has been growing for four years

So far this year, ridership across Fresno’s bus system, FAX, has nearly rebounded to pre-pandemic levels. 

With over 5.2 million boardings, FAX’s ridership in the first half of 2025 is 5% greater than during the same time period last year.

If the trend continues, FAX is on track to easily surpass 10 million bus trips by the end of the year.

Last year’s total ridership was 10.28 million boardings — nearly 95% of pre-pandemic ridership the agency posted in 2019.  

It’s a bright spot in an otherwise difficult time for transit agencies in many parts of the US, which have struggled to regain riders lost during the pandemic — many who shifted their commute patterns or switched to hybrid or remote work entirely.

“We didn’t cut anything during the pandemic, we kept service — even though it was 10 riders at the time, we kept them,” explained Greg Barfield, the city’s director of transportation.

Before the pandemic halted everyone in 2020, FAX was starting to make some ridership gains, after declining ridership since 2008.

But the housing crash of 2008 — and Fresno’s near-bankruptcy miss after that — led to service cuts, eliminating night service and higher frequencies, Barfield said.

“I think that really hurt the rider,” he added.

Back in the second half of the 2010s, Barfield said new investments in bus rapid transit along Blackstone-Cesar Chavez, higher frequency service, and restoring night service brought riders back. By 2017, ridership was increasing again.

Today, buses run at 15-minute intervals on many of the city’s bus routes. 

The agency has also invested in service expansions over the past few years. As of August 2023, buses on FAX’s Route 34 now go further south, serving the Amazon, Ulta, and IRS warehouses on North and Central Avenues – where over 5,000 people work, according to 2022 census data.

Barfield said the addition of bus service to the NorthPointe Industrial Center has been a boon for ridership along Route 34, with upwards of 20,000 boardings per month.

Route 45 — which runs primarily along Ashlan Avenue — expanded west in 2023, to serve Justin Garza High and Glacier Point Middle School, west of the 99. 

FAX also launched more service along Route 3, along Herndon Avenue, extending to the El Paseo Shopping Center at Herndon and 99, and to Clovis North High School and Clovis Community College.

Last month, FAX launched a new route along Church Avenue, connecting several schools and job centers from southwest to southeast Fresno.

But transit’s popularity in Fresno remains elusive, even with people who have less reliable access to cars. 

Around just 1% of commuters take public transit in Fresno, less than the statewide average. The system is a lifeline for students, people with disabilities, and others who don’t have access to a reliable car.

The agency has made significant gains with people who do have more transportation choices — nearly 30% of people who ride FAX do have a car, according to the agency’s most recent passenger survey, taken in 2024. 

Barfield says that’s because FAX has expanded their free or discounted transit pass offerings, from seniors, veterans, and people with Medi-Cal to students in Fresno and Central Unified, State Center Community College District, and Fresno State. He said a new deal for discounted transit passes for students in Sanger Unified is in the works.

But experts point to key challenges that make more widespread adoption of transit more difficult in Fresno — simply, the convenience of driving in a sprawling, low-density city like Fresno. A 2024 study from Lyft found that Fresno has the fourth-fastest car commute in America.

Local transit leaders cited “leapfrog development at the fringe of the metropolitan area” as a key concern for the future health of the region’s transit systems in a 2023 report.

As the city continues to expand its boundaries, it becomes more expensive to provide transit service to far-flung areas, where fewer people live. 

“Land use is key to making transit work. It does not work well with these dispersed environments, despite the money we throw at it,” said Evelyn Blumenberg, director of the Lewis Center for Regional Studies in a 2021 interview with Fresnoland. Blumenberg is also a a professor of urban planning at UCLA’s Luskin School of Policy,. 

Barfield said most of his future concerns around the city’s transit future lie in uncertainty with the agency’s funding — as debates around Measure C heat up and state leaders decide whether to extend the cap and trade program beyond 2030.

For now, FAX is trying to figure out how to expand more north-south service in the growing neighborhoods west of Highway 99.