NONURBANIZED PUBLIC TRANSPORTATION NEEDS ASSESSMENT

The ability to predict the demand for rural intracounty public transpo rtation has become increasingly important in recent years. In this stu dy an attempt was made to predict the future intracounty public transp ortation ridership demand in rural Nebraska. Existing and historical t ransit operating and socioeconomic and demographic data were collected for the counties and cities in Nebraska that have rural transportatio n services. This information was used to develop a series of equations fdr predicting the future ridership demand in rural areas with or wit hout existing public transportation services. Two equations were devel oped for estimating the ridership demand for counties and cities that currently do not have any public transportation services. One equation for estimating ridership demand was developed for each of the countie s and cities that currently have transit services. According to the ri dership demand projections made in this study, it seems that the exist ing intracounty public transportation systems in rural Nebraska are pr oviding sufficient services to meet the present and future demand in m ost rural areas.