Muni Frequent Rider Miles?

Geary Blvd
Photo by Michael Risenhoover

I read a tweet the other day by @funderbug:

“Too bad they don’t offer bus miles, you know, like airline miles…”

Too bad, yeah. But it got me thinking: What if SFMTA had some sort of rewards program for loyal riders? All default jokes about “loyalty” aside, I think this is an amusing mental exercise.

My most frequently used route is the 49-Van Ness, which I ride 3.3 miles from the Mission to the end of the line, at North Point and Van Ness. From there, I hop on a 47-Van Ness for 0.75 miles to get to work. 4.15 miles to get there. And I repeat that ride in the afternoons to get home: 8.3 miles per day

Multiplied by five, I rack up 41.5 miles on Muni per week. Multiply that by 50 weeks per year, and we’re looking at a whoppin’ 2,075 miles per year!!! Holy crap!

Sooooo, what should my prize options be? Yeah, a bus that runs on time and all that. But what else?

How many miles have you piled up over the years on Muni?

4 comments

  • How did you figure out your mileage?

    As near as I can figure, my commute from Bernal Heights to the Inner Sunset racks up a daily total of about 14 miles on a combo of MUNI Trains, busses and BART.

    If I just took the Bus, it would only be around 9 miles a day, but take longer.

    • hi Erik,

      don’t remember now which one I used, but there are several distance calculators out there that use Google Maps (my preferred map app).

  • Ah, I tried to figure it with Google Maps.

    Even more telling, how much time a year do you spend on Public Transit?

    I spend approximately a minimum of 90 minutes a day, 5 days a week.

    I get a lot of reading done.

  • Sam

    They actually just started a loyalty program last month here in Minneapolis. It’s called Ride to Rewards and you get points by using your Go-To card (our version of the Clipper). You can trade in points for gift cards or bus fare, but a $20 VISA gift card is actually less than than $20 in bus fare. Why not just get the gift card and spend it on reloading your Go-To. Huh….

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