The "Passenger destination" of May 2020 implemented that each passenger wants to go to a specific station, and not just anywhere. With this update the passenger economy changed considerably: The game keeps track of which other towns a given town is connected to, and generates passengers for those other towns - and only those towns. In other words, if a town is not reachable from your town, those passengers never appear at the station. This means that towns generate many more passengers if that town can reach more other towns - directly as well as indirectly.