Transit safety incidents

American transit killed 191 people in 2008 and 345 in 2024. That much is a count, and counts rise when systems grow.

This did not grow. Service fell over the same period, so the rate rose faster than the count: from 5.35 deaths per hundred million vehicle revenue miles to 9.65. Something got worse that is not explained by there being more transit.

Revenue miles are the denominator rather than boardings, and the choice matters here more than anywhere else on the site. This span covers 2020, when agencies kept running service that nobody rode. Divided by boardings the rate would appear to double in a single year, and what it would be measuring is the ridership collapse.

Most of these deaths are not passengers. The breakdown below shows who they are.

Of 337 deaths, 33 were passengers. Most of the rest were people on the track or the road, and 65 were suicides.

Set against distance travelled, that is — deaths per billion passenger miles counting everyone, and — counting riders alone — a difference of roughly eight times.

Both are true. They answer different questions: the first is how many people die in connection with transit, the second is the risk of being on board. Quoting the first as the second is the commonest way these figures are misread.