Indeed it is comparing Apples and Oranges. Those three stations (pre Covid) had less passengers than Edale alone!
To be fair Edale is a sparsely populated area and probably has no more than a dozen commuters, but it receives masses of incoming visitors for outdoor pursuits - like walking to Scotland along the Pennine Way. (The station and village car parks and all surrounding available roads, verges and gateways overflow with their cars on fine weekends and in school holidays.)
There are no regular buses to Edale, only rail replacement mini-buses as required. Betchworth, Dorking West, Gomshall and Chilworth in Surrey seem to have at least an hourly no 32 Stagecoach service that will stop nearer many homes than trains.
However there are similarities. In the Hope Valley almost every household has access to at least one car. Once a public transport service is less frequent than half hourly the default option for most is that car, that's unless the start and finish points are very near to stations or bus stops. At 2 hourly or worse (quite likely due to skip stops and cancellations at short notice) public transport is only viable for a very, very small percentage of journeys.
Evidence from the Hope Valley is that most potential outgoing users can't be bothered to check which train skip stops and when, or whether the regular train is very late or cancelled. Punctuality on this line puts all the stations in the bottom 500 in the country - and usually in the worst 250 out of over 2500. See On Time Trains statistics for Hathersage which also shows the other stations;
https://www.ontimetrains.co.uk/stations/HSG
To capture a greater market share public transport has to be frequent, have capacity, be reliable and well priced. Frequency and reliability on this rail route will not be significantly improved until the current Capacity Scheme work is completed and timetables fully recast. Probably not until May 2024 I'd now estimate. Capacity is easier by running longer trains and that's starting to happen. Pricing is a thorny subject at present because it can be cheaper to take a stopping service from Sheffield to Manchester than from an intermediate station.
