Overview

This report analyzes UTA OnDemand ridership data from 2021 to 2025 for Salt Lake County, Utah. UTA OnDemand is an on-demand microtransit service operated by the Utah Transit Authority (UTA) that allows riders to request trips within designated service areas. The data was obtained through a GRAMA (Government Records Access and Management Act) request and includes pickup and dropoff coordinates for all service areas across Salt Lake County.

The analysis covers the following topics:

  • Ridership trends by year, month, and hour of day
  • Spatial visualization of trip destinations via heatmaps
  • Identification of the most frequently visited destinations

Load Packages

The following packages are used in this analysis. The tidyverse package is used for data wrangling and visualization. The sf and mapview packages are used for spatial data processing and mapping. The leaflet and leaflet.extras packages are used for interactive heatmap visualization. The tigris package is used to load U.S. Census geographic boundary data.

Load Data

The dataset covers 2021 through mid-2025 and was pre-combined into a single CSV file from 11 individual data files obtained through the GRAMA request. Each record includes trip-level data with origin and destination coordinates, as well as the request creation timestamp. The total number of records and column names are printed below to verify the data was loaded correctly.

## Total records: 1206700
## Columns: Request.Creation.Date, Request.Creation.Time, Session.ID, Request.ID, Request.Status, Origin.Address, Origin.Lat, Origin.Lng, Origin.Zone, Destination.Address, Destination.Lat, Destination.Lng

Wrangle Data

Convert to Spatial Data

The dataset is converted from a standard data frame into a spatial (sf) object using the destination longitude and latitude columns. The coordinate reference system (CRS) is set to WGS84 (EPSG: 4326), which is the standard geographic coordinate system used for GPS data.

Extract Date-Time Variables

The Request.Creation.Time column is parsed into a datetime object using the mdy_hm() function from the lubridate package. Individual time components — year, month, date, hour, and year-month — are extracted as separate columns to allow for temporal analysis in the sections below.

Analyze Ridership

Ridership by Year

This section analyzes the total number of UTA OnDemand trips per year from 2022 to 2024. The bar chart below shows the annual ridership totals. The group_by() and summarize() functions are used to calculate the total number of trips for each year.

The bar chart shows that ridership increased each year from 2022 to 2024. This upward trend suggests that UTA OnDemand has been growing in popularity and usage across Salt Lake County over the three-year period.

Ridership by Month

This section analyzes the monthly ridership totals from 2022 to 2024. The bar chart below shows the number of trips for each month. This allows for identification of seasonal patterns and any months with unusually high or low ridership.

The monthly chart shows that ridership is generally consistent throughout the year, with some variation across months. Ridership levels in 2024 are noticeably higher than in 2022 and 2023 for most months, which is consistent with the year-over-year growth observed in the annual chart above.

Average Ridership by Hour of Day (2023)

This section analyzes the average number of trips by hour of day for the year 2023. To calculate the average, the total trips are first counted for each combination of month, date, and hour. These daily totals are then averaged by hour across all days in 2023. This approach gives a more accurate representation of typical hourly demand compared to simply summing all trips by hour.

The chart shows that ridership peaks in the late morning to early afternoon hours, roughly between 9AM and 2PM. Trip demand drops significantly in the early morning hours (midnight to 6AM) and declines again in the late evening. This pattern suggests that UTA OnDemand is primarily used for midday trips rather than traditional commute-hour travel.

Spatial Visualization

Sample Points Map

The map below displays 10,000 randomly sampled trip destination points from the full dataset. This provides a general overview of the geographic distribution of trip destinations across Salt Lake County. Each point represents a single trip destination. A sample is used instead of the full dataset to improve map rendering performance.

The sample points map shows that trip destinations are spread across a large portion of Salt Lake County, with higher concentrations visible in certain urban and suburban areas. The distribution suggests that UTA OnDemand is being used across a wide geographic range rather than being concentrated in one specific area.

Ridership Heatmaps by Time of Day (October 2023)

This section visualizes the spatial distribution of trip destinations at three different times of day — 8AM, 1PM, and 5PM — using data from October 2023. October was selected as a representative month because it avoids major holiday disruptions and reflects typical fall ridership patterns. The heatmaps use a viridis color gradient where purple represents low trip density and yellow represents high trip density. Use the zoom and pan controls to explore neighborhood-level patterns.

8AM

The heatmap below shows the spatial distribution of trip destinations at 8AM in October 2023. This time period corresponds to the morning hours when some riders may be traveling to work, medical appointments, or other early destinations.

1PM

The heatmap below shows the spatial distribution of trip destinations at 1PM in October 2023. This time period corresponds to the midday peak hours identified in the hourly ridership chart above.

5PM

The heatmap below shows the spatial distribution of trip destinations at 5PM in October 2023. Comparing the 8AM, 1PM, and 5PM heatmaps allows for observation of how destination patterns shift throughout the day across the county.

The three heatmaps show that high-density destination areas are concentrated in similar geographic locations across all three time periods, suggesting that certain locations consistently attract a high volume of UTA OnDemand trips regardless of the time of day. However, the intensity and spread of the heat clusters varies between morning, midday, and evening hours.

Top Destinations

Most Frequently Visited Addresses

This section identifies the destination addresses with the highest number of trips in the full dataset. The group_by() and summarize() functions are used to count the total number of trips for each unique destination address. The addresses are normalized to uppercase and extra whitespace is removed before counting to ensure consistent grouping. The table below shows the top 20 most frequently visited destinations.

## # A tibble: 20 × 2
##    Destination.Address                                                     count
##    <chr>                                                                   <int>
##  1 DAYBREAK PARKWAY TRAX STATION                                           34296
##  2 DRAPER FRONTRUNNER STATION                                              13152
##  3 CRESCENT VIEW TRAX STATION                                              11055
##  4 ARENA STATION                                                           10488
##  5 DRAPER TOWN CENTER TRAX STATION                                          8542
##  6 WOODS CROSS STATION                                                      6940
##  7 DAYBREAK PARKWAY STATION, SOUTH JORDAN                                   6423
##  8 WEST HIGH SCHOOL, NORTH 300 WEST, SALT LAKE CITY                         5774
##  9 SOUTH JORDAN FRONTRUNNER STATION                                         4444
## 10 WALMART SUPERCENTER, SOUTH JORDAN GATEWAY, SOUTH JORDAN                  3484
## 11 WALMART SUPERCENTER, SOUTH HAMILTON VIEW ROAD, RIVERTON                  3112
## 12 KIMBALLS LANE TRAX STATION                                               2994
## 13 11440 GRANDVILLE AVENUE, SOUTH JORDAN                                    2929
## 14 NORTHWEST MIDDLE SCHOOL, WEST 1700 NORTH, SALT LAKE CITY                 2927
## 15 DESERET INDUSTRIES THRIFT STORE & DONATION CENTER, CREEK MEADOW ROAD, …  2814
## 16 DRAPER STATION, DRAPER                                                   2732
## 17 WEST HIGH SCHOOL, N 300 W, SALT LAKE CITY                                2578
## 18 BENSON GRIST MILL PARK & RIDE                                            2446
## 19 1940 W NORTH TEMPLE STATION (NORTH SIDE)                                 2387
## 20 SALT LAKE CENTRAL STATION                                                2263

Bar Chart: Top 20 Destinations

The bar chart below visualizes the top 20 most frequently visited destinations, sorted from highest to lowest trip count. The data labels at the end of each bar show the exact trip count for each destination.

The bar chart shows that there is a significant difference in trip count between the top destination and the remaining destinations on the list. The top destination receives considerably more trips than the others, which suggests that it is a major activity center or facility that generates a disproportionately high demand for UTA OnDemand service.

Map: Top 20 Destinations

The map below shows the geographic locations of the top 20 most frequently visited destinations. The size and color of each bubble represents the trip count — larger and brighter bubbles indicate higher trip counts. Utah county boundaries are shown as gray outlines for geographic reference.

The map shows that the top destinations are geographically clustered in specific parts of Salt Lake County rather than being evenly distributed. This clustering pattern indicates that UTA OnDemand ridership is concentrated around key activity centers such as medical facilities, shopping centers, or transit hubs within the county.

Summary

This analysis examined UTA OnDemand ridership data from 2021 to 2025 for Salt Lake County, Utah. The key findings are summarized below.

Ridership Trends: Total ridership increased each year from 2022 to 2024, indicating that UTA OnDemand has been growing in usage over time. Monthly ridership was generally consistent throughout the year, with 2024 showing higher levels than previous years across most months.

Hourly Patterns: Average ridership by hour of day in 2023 shows that trip demand peaks between 9AM and 2PM. This midday peak pattern suggests that UTA OnDemand is primarily used for non-commute trips, such as medical appointments, shopping, and other daytime activities.

Spatial Patterns: The heatmaps and destination maps show that trip destinations are concentrated in specific geographic clusters within Salt Lake County. Certain locations consistently attract high volumes of trips across all times of day, suggesting that these areas are major activity centers for UTA OnDemand riders.

Top Destinations: The top 20 most frequently visited destinations account for a disproportionately high share of total trips, with the highest-ranked destination receiving significantly more trips than others on the list. These high-demand destinations are geographically clustered in specific parts of the county.

Data source: UTA GRAMA Request — OnDemand Pickup & Dropoff Coordinate Data, 2021–2025