But all of that extra operating funding is disappearing over time. And with some agencies, they expect it’ll last another year, maybe two, but they’re not sure if their ridership is projected to be back at the same levels that it once was.

How could transit become more environmentally friendly?

Kari Watkins: There’s actually a lot that can be done to our system if we electrify transit further. For decades, we’ve had transit lines that had overhead systems to power it, or a third rail system, where it’s powered from underneath, like our subway systems.

All of those are really expensive to build. But battery technology that is coming around for our passenger vehicles is also coming around and improving greatly for larger-scale vehicles, such as trucks and buses. This gives us the ability to start to electrify routes that are running on pavement in streets. The hang-up is simply that we have to run these routes for an entire day and the window to charge them is just a small window overnight.

Watch the full interview to hear more about public transit.

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This article is republished from The Conversation, an independent nonprofit news site dedicated to sharing ideas from academic experts. It was written by: Kari Edison Watkins, University of California, Davis. Like this article? subscribe to our weekly newsletter.

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Kari Edison Watkins is an Associate Professor for the University of California at Davis and has received funding from the US Department of Transportation, the Transportation Research Board, the National Science Foundation, and multiple state and local agencies.