I had a little more time to look at the stats over lunch and noticed the following:
Ridership at 3 stations along the old Queensbridge stations is up considerably. 57/6 is up 12%, Lex/63 is up 18% and Queensbridge is up 12%. Only Roosevelt Island is nearly flat. This would seem to indicate that -- with the F running via 63rd Street -- riders are finding these stations much more valuable and not using alternative stations as much. Roosevelt Island ridership doesn't increase, because those riders never really had a meaningful alternative to lame service.
The station with the least change was E 143 / St Mary's St on the 6, where there were just 64 fewer riders in 2003. Of course, with only about 750 passengers each day to begin with, this station was already one of the 15 least used in the system.
Despite a decrease in ridership, 86 St (Lex) moved up from the 11th busiest station in 2002 to a tie for the 8th busiest in 2003. (There may be a typo in the 2003 stats, as it seems unlikely that ridership at this station would be exactly the same number as at the Canal Street complex).
Of the 20 busiest stations in 2003, ridership was down at 15 of them as compared to 2002. Ridership was only up at Penn Station (1/2/3/9), Union Square, 14th St (6th/7th aves.) and 96th St (1/2/3/9). Overall, the total ridership is down 2%.
Is the novelty of the Franklin Shuttle wearing off? At Park Place (the only station where shuttle ridership can be measured without including other lines), ridership was down 11% in 2003.
What's going on in South Brooklyn?? F ridership in Brooklyn is for the most part way down from Church Avenue and beyond:
Church Ave -- down 3.7%
Ditmas Ave -- down 6.1%
18 Ave -- down 2.6%
Avenue I -- down 8.7%
Bay Pkwy -- up 1.6%
Avenue N -- down 5.5%
Avenue P -- down 9.4%
Kings Hwy -- down 6.8%
Avenue U -- down 9.3%
It doesn't look like a shift to the Sea Beach...
Bay Pkwy -- down 1.0%
Kings Hwy -- up 1.6%
Avenue U -- down 1.5%
86 Street -- up 2.7%
Or to the Brighton
Ave H -- down 6.4%
Ave J -- down 4.2%
Ave M -- down 3.7%
Kings Hwy -- down 4.8%
Ave U -- down 5.2%
Neck Rd -- down 6.5%
Sheepshead Bay -- down 0.3%
So where did they go??
CG