Nearly 600,000 Passengers Boarded Metro Trains On Day Of LA Women's March
LOS ANGELES (CBSLA.com) — Metro officials offered some insight Tuesday into crowd estimates for Saturday's Women's March Los Angeles, reporting that roughly 592,000 passengers boarded its trains.
About 232,000 riders board Metro trains on a typical Saturday, the transit agency said.
"This was an amazing experience for our region, as well as for Metro," Metro board Chair John Fasana said. "Whatever your political thoughts, it was exciting to see so many people exercising their right to demonstrate peacefully. And it spoke to the crowds that there was no violence and that despite crowding, at the end of the day our patrons were safe."
Officials said riders remained upbeat despite crowded platforms and trains.
The Los Angeles march was just one of many similar marches held across the country Saturday.
Metro beefed up service and security to handle what organizers had first estimated would be about 75,000 marchers.
As the numbers increased, the agency added rail cars and increased frequency of service, ultimately boosting capacity by 60 percent.
Organizers estimated at one point that as many as 750,000 people attended the downtown march.
The Los Angeles Police Department estimated the crowd at "well past" 100,000 and the Los Angeles Fire Department also pegged the crowd at "over 100,000."
Public and private buses also carried many marchers to the event.
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