Sound Transit & Seattle Mariners Partnership

Target Audience: People attending the Seattle Mariners baseball games.

Strategy Objective:Offer free rides on Link to the game for Mariners ticket holders and figure out how the Mariners could reimburse Sound Transit for this fan benefit. Strategy: Sound Transit & the Mariners were clear on the goal, but Sound Transit needed to keep their farebox recovery at policy-adopted levels, and the Mariners had to get a proportional return on investment. We looked at what was done by other transit agencies and found our situation fairly unique. The Sound Transit fares and finance team looking at ridership on Link for past Mariners seasons and estimating what boost to ridership we would see if rides were free to the customer.

Situation Challenge: Sound Transit and the Mariners partnered to solve a problem. The Mariners had fan data that barriers to game attendance are congestion and the cost of parking. Sound Transit's Link light rail delivers fans to the game reliably and efficiently. Additionally, Sound Transit was interested in: - Reducing barriers to riding transit, particularly for new riders - Mitigating operational issues on high-volume dates/times such as lines at ticket vending machines - Introducing the benefits of transit to new riders

Results Impact: - Kickoff event at Stadium Station resulted in lots of regional media coverage - 140K impressions on social media - Anecdotal positive feedback in person (ambassadors) and on social - Ridership: Planning modeling predicted that Mariners ridership would jump to about 5.6 percent (from 5% in 2017) with the free ride promotion. Sample counts showed it ended up being closer to 7 percent'a 37 percent increase.

Why Submit: This entry should win an AdWheel for the following reasons: 1. This pilot program helped to alieve the increasing congestion of people trying to get to and from the baseball game. 2. It's innovative ' our research with other transit agencies revealed only one other like partnership in the county ' between the Phoenix Suns and Valley Metro. 3. We got first-time riders to experience the ease and efficiency of our light rail system and hopefully continue to be regular riders.