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Larkspur Ferry parking expansion not needed
Abstract
Local authorities are planning a huge expansion of the Larkspur Ferry parking lots. The parking lots have 2,023 slots. They want to add 700 to 1,000 slots (increases of 34.6% to 49.4%, respectively).
They believe this huge expansion is warranted because they expect Marin County to grow by that much over the next 20 years. But, Sacramento's own optimistic projections reveal that Marin County will not grow at all over the next 20 years.
Additionally, the Larkspur ridership has plummeted since the onset of COVID. Currently, the parking lots are about 40% empty due to the permanent impact of Work From Home (WFH).
Since the onset of COVID, the San Francisco office vacancy rate has risen from 4.7% to 33.7%. And, it is still rising confirming the permanent effect of WFH.
For Larkspur ridership to just regain its pre-pandemic level, the following conditions need to kick in:
1) The San Francisco office vacancy rate to drop from the current 33.7% level down to the pre-pandemic level of 4.7%;
2) The San Francisco office supply level to not shrink due to office-to-residential conversion that would artificially lower the office vacancy rate;
3) All San Francisco based employers to mandate return-to-work 5 days a week.
The confluence of all three conditions is very unlikely. In summary, the existing parking lots capacity is more than enough for our new normal ridership level.
Introduction
The Marin IJ published on November 1st a cover page article titled "Ferry expansion plans scrutinized". The plans include increasing the total capacity of the parking lots at the Larkspur Ferry Terminal by 700 to 1,000 parking stalls. This represents a 34.6% to 49.4% increase over the current parking lots capacity of 2,023 stalls.
Jacobs, a consulting firm, is leading a study on behalf of the Golden Gate Transit (GGT). I have attached their presentation at the end of this essay.
The Cult of Growth
Within this article, David Dick, a Jacobs consulting project manager, made two irrational assertions. They are:
- The number of riders will double by 2044; and
- This growth in ridership will be driven by Marin County's population growth.
Jacobs supports these assertions by sharing this graph regarding Larkspur ridership from 2005 to 2019 before the pandemic. Jacobs counts a round trip as two riders. I count only the rides to the City to evaluate more precisely the parking needs vs capacity.
Jacobs observes that Larkspur average weekday ridership rose by close to 30% from 4,892 in 2005 to 6,348 in 2019. That corresponds to an annual growth rate of 1.9%. In view of that, they are perfectly comfortable nearly doubling the annual growth rate to 3.5% to double ridership over the next 20 years.
This does not make any sense. For several reasons.
The first one, going back to their graph above, while ridership did nearly increase by 30% from 2005 to 2019, notice that it remained virtually flat from 2014 to 2019. Thus, a good five years before the pandemic hit, the growth in ridership had already flattened. Why would all of a sudden growth reach record level (3.5% per year) above the pre-pandemic level and keep on rising at this record pace for the next 20 years?
Let's investigate this situation further on two dimensions.
- A review of Larkspur Ferry historical ridership trends
- Marin County demographic outlook
A review of Larkspur Ferry historical ridership trends
Independent of Jacobs vague figures, there are no publicly released ridership figures for the Larkspur Ferry alone. GGT annual reports disclose figures for the whole Ferry system that includes Sausalito and Tiburon (since 2017). So, I compiled figures from 2009 to 2023 (fiscal years ended June 30), using their annual reports. And, I estimated 2024 using their 2024/2025 Budget that disclosed the following ridership metric (see graph below).
I estimated my 2024 Passenger Count by doing this simple calculation:
2023 Passenger Count/76 x 86 = 2024 Passenger Count
1,156,000/76 x 86 = 1,291,117
Thereafter I developed this set of estimations to arrive at the specific ridership for the Larkspur Ferry alone going to San Francisco.
From left to right, I calculated the estimates as follows.
Per working day to SF = Passenger Count/240 working days/2 to only count rides from Larkspur to SF and eliminate the return rides. This assumption overestimates the ridership as I do not exclude the weekend ridership. I include them all with the working days.
Larkspur ridership to SF
Here I used a weighting of Larkspur Ferry alone vs the total GGT Ferry system. For further detail check Endnote [1].
Larkspur parked
Jacobs indicated that 79.4% of the Larkspur Ferry riders use the parking lot. I made the assumption that there is in average 1.33 passenger per vehicle. So, the number of parking spots used in 2009 is equal to:
3,429 x 79.4%/1.33 = 2,047
As a % of capacity
This shows the number of parking spots used divided by the parking lots total capacity. If this % of capacity is greater than 100%, it indicates that Ferry riders had to park somewhere else in Larkspur to use the Ferry. In 2009, this figure is:
2,047/2,023 = 101%.
This last column can serve as an intuitive data-check. Given that during the entire pre-pandemic period these figures exceed 100%, and at times by a wide margin, I most likely overestimated Larkspur's ridership.
Given my optimistic assumption regarding ridership, my analysis is rather lenient.
Visualizing Larkspur ridership trends
The four graphs below visualize the data regarding ridership trends (daily average during the workweek). They depict:
- Ridership to San Francisco
- Estimated number of parked vehicles
- Parked vehicles as a % of parking capacity
- Parking Utilization Index with 2016 = 100.
The vertical red dashed line highlights the abrupt downturn in ridership due to the onset of COVID during fiscal 2021 (covering the July 1, 2020 - June 30, 2021 period).
The main takeaway from the above graphs is that ridership & parking utilization have both plunged during the onset of COVID in fiscal 2021. And, now a full four years after the onset of COVID, ridership & parking are still much less than half of the peak back in fiscal 2016. Thus, if parking was deemed adequate back in fiscal 2016, we now have over twice as much parking as we currently utilize in fiscal 2024 (year ended June 30).
On Monday, November 4th, I visually inspected the main parking lot. And, I could readily see that a very large portion of the lot was empty.
GGT and Jacobs ignore WFH
As mentioned earlier, GGT and Jacobs plan to add 700 to 1,000 parking spots on top of the 2,023 existing ones (Plan A and B in the graph below). Keep in mind that the estimated daily utilization during the workweek in 2024 is currently only 1,173 [2].
According to GGT, these plans are all going to work out because of the expected growth in Marin County's population over the next 20 years. These plans would entail that GGT expects Marin County's population to grow by 34.6% to 49.4% (increase in Plan A and B, respectively). This also assumes that the Work From Home (WFH) phenomenon will entirely disappear. And, that current 2024 ridership level will either increase by:
a) 2,723/1,173 - 1 = 132%; or
b) 3,023/1,173 - 1 = 158% [3]
The entire disappearance of WFH is not realistic. Return-To-Work (RTF) is mandated by a generation of aging leaders (CEOs, Governors, etc.). They are in their 50s and over. Within 10 years, many will have retired. The new generation of leaders will recognize the benefits of WFH [4] and the handicaps of RTF [5].
For all the noise about RTF, a lot of employers in San Francisco have not gotten the memo. Indeed, San Francisco office vacancy rate has to be the highest in the Nation and it has risen from 4.7% in 2019 Q2 to 33.7% in 2024 Q2.
Source: San Francisco City Government. https://www.sf.gov/data/office-vacancy-rate
There is no way the Larkspur Ferry ridership can go back to pre-pandemic level until the San Francisco office vacancy rate also drops back to pre-pandemic level. However, if the office vacancy rate drops because of office-to-residential conversion, that will not help the Larkspur Ferry ridership.
Well, going back to Marin County's expected growth. Let's fact-check GGT's growth assumptions.
Marin County Demographic Outlook
Marin County's population has steadily declined from 263,130 in 2016 to 252,844 in 2024.
Source: California Department of Finance Demographic Research Unit (DRU)
Keep in mind that the ongoing decline is in the midst of an immigration crisis. Immigration should have boosted Marin County's population. But, it has not. Marin County is a very old county with a negative natural growth rate (deaths exceed births), and little immigration.
Before looking at the DRU population projections, keep in mind that DRU has an ongoing history of way overestimating population growth. Nevertheless, on a relative basis the DRU is the California agency that generates the less absurd population growth estimates.
Ok, keeping the overestimation bias in mind, let's look at the DRU projections 20 years out.
Main takeaway from the table above:
- Over the next 20 years, DRU expects Marin population growth to remain nearly perfectly flat.
- DRU's projections are overestimating right of the bat. They projected that the population in 2024 would be 254,283. That is a huge error of + 1,439 in the very first year of the forecast.
Endnotes
[1] My starting point is that Larkspur Ferry offers 19 daily round trips to San Francisco during the week. Sausalito and Tiburon (since 2017) offer 7. I also assume that the Larkspur Ferries transport twice as many passengers as the other Ferries. I don't know that this is a case. But, I figure I would go with a generous assumption so as not being accused of underestimating Larkspur's ridership.
The next step is to figure what is the proportion of Larkspur's rides out of all the GGT Ferry rides.
Until 2016 this proportion is: 19/(19 + 3.5) = 84%
Since 2017, this proportion is: 19/(19 + 3.5 + 3.5) = 73%
[2] As stated earlier I think my estimate is probably too high for two main reasons. The first one is because I did not exclude weekend rides. I included everything into weekday rides. The second reason is because I derive parking utilization rates that are steadily over 100% throughout the entire pre-pandemic period. And, I don't think that is accurate. It is too high.
[3] To calculate Plan A & B increase in ridership over 2024 level, I used the number of parking stalls used. This causally relates to number of riders. So, using riders numbers should give you the same prospective growth rates. However, Gabe Paulson,on the Transportation Authority of Marin Board, believes that over time a smaller proportion of commuters will access the Larkspur Ferry by car. This would only strengthen my case that the Larkspur Ferry parking expantion is not necessary.
[4] The WFH benefits are numerous. They benefit both the employees and employers. For the employees the benefits include a huge time savings not having to commute, resulting in better life balance. For the employers, the economic incentives of WFH are huge as they can save a ton of money by foregoing expensive office space leases. They can also harness talent nationwide. For society, WFH is associated with huge environmental benefits.
[5] RTF, as it is currently practiced often does not make sense. Employees often return to randomly assigned anonymous cubicles. They are often completely separate from their respective bosses and teams. And, they have to meet on Zoom anyway. So, what is the point of RTF?
Gaetan Lion is an independent researcher with expertise in economics, econometrics, investments, risk management, statistics, and quantitative analysis. His areas of interest include demographics, economics, investments, Climate Change, health care, sports, and politics.