APTA Chair Flora Castillo called on the more than 700 Legislative Conference attendees to spread the word about public transportation in her ­Opening Session remarks.

“Right now we have a unique opportunity to influence the nation’s investment in public ­transportation,” she said. “MAP-21 was a step in the right direction, but we have more to do before it expires in September 2014. We need to ramp up our efforts now.”

Pointing to her theme, “It’s All About the People!”, Castillo noted that the public transit industry directly employs nearly 400,000 people and indirectly supports another 1.9 million jobs. “There’s strength in these numbers because there are people behind these numbers,” she said. “Every individual in this room has a compelling message about the value of public transit to people in your community. It’s time to make ­public transportation come alive for Congress by talking about the lives we change.”

APTA President & CEO Michael Melaniphy announced at the session that “public transportation is more widely used, more valued, and more in demand now than at any time in our nation’s history.” He pointed to the 10.5 billion trips taken on public transit during 2012, a 1.5 percent increase over the previous year. (See related stories.)

“Two big reasons for the increased national ridership are high, volatile gas prices and, in certain localities, a ­recovering economy with more people returning to work,” said Melaniphy. “Public transportation saves people money, and people save even more so when gas prices spike. Also, since nearly 60 percent of trips taken on public transportation are for work commutes, it makes sense that ridership increases are in the areas where the economy has improved and new jobs have been added.”

Noting that people are ­changing their attitudes regarding travel, ­Melaniphy said: “There is a sea change going on in the way that people look at transportation. Americans want travel choices; they want to be able to choose the best travel option for their lives. This is an exciting time for the public transportation industry as more and more ­Americans support it and want it.”

Melaniphy also pointed out that ­voters across the U.S. approved 49 out of 62 transit-oriented state and local ballot initiatives in 2012: nearly 80 percent of the measures. “This extremely high rate of success demonstrates how important public transportation is to people and to communities,” he noted.

He called on conference participants to let their elected officials “touch transit” by inviting them to their properties. “The federal government must continue to invest in public transportation,” he emphasized. “Every dollar invested in public transit yields $4 in benefits. This is not the time to cut funding; now is the time to invest.”

RouteMatch Software sponsored the opening session.