WMATA/Public Transportation Thread

[thebluefood]

With the will they-won't they story line around Qatar kicking in $100,000 to keep Metro open as the latest in a long stream of facepalm moments for the area's main public transportation provider. I don't use Metro regularly - only when visiting family and that's usually on the weekend - but God knows I hear about it every time I have a chat with them about it. From what I've gathered, Maryland, the Commonwealth, and Maryland struck a historic deal in March for consistent funding but as my father likes to say

"Metro's trifling, son." 

 

 

[Springfield]

It’s a ****ing shame.  I will only use metro if there is no other option and I HATE driving in the city.

 

Metro didn’t always suck.  It seemed decent in the 90’s.  What the hell happened?

[No Excuses]

1 minute ago, Springfield said:

It’s a ****ing shame.  I will only use metro if there is no other option and I HATE driving in the city.

 

Metro didn’t always suck.  It seemed decent in the 90’s.  What the hell happened?

 

It has been crumbling badly since 2012. IMO that’s when we started getting consistent track fires and weekly delays during peak hours. Which ultimately led to the “safetrack” project in 2016.

 

Also, WMATA is planning on shutting down multiple blue line stations next year during the summer for more track work. 

 

Years and years of neglect to the public transportation infrastructure in the area has finally caught up. Yet there are ridiculous proposals like the gondola from Georgetown to Rosslyn that may cost upwards of $100 million.

[bearrock]

Are buses the money loser?  I feel like I read that in an article once, but I could be totally wrong on that.  

 

Metro subways were decent when I used it back in '03.  Then again, I switched to driving after a year, so maybe not so much?  Although, with all the mobile entertainment available now, I probably would've stuck it out now.

[thebluefood]

3 minutes ago, No Excuses said:

 

Years and years of neglect to the public transportation infrastructure in the area has finally caught up. Yet there are ridiculous proposals like the gondola from Georgetown to Rosslyn that may cost upwards of $100 million.

Oh, man! That's a funny joke.

[Looks it up]

[It's legit]

http://www.georgetownrosslyngondola.com

...what the actual ****, Georgetown? 

[thebluefood]

Also: found this article from GGWash on Metro's consistent maintenance woes. They say it isn't because it's a two-track system (which apparently is a common critique of Metro).

 

https://ggwash.org/view/41711/metro-doesnt-have-four-tracks-thats-not-why-maintenance-is-a-problem

 

Quote

Lines with more tracks aren’t that way for redundancy, but rather capacity: they make it possible to fit twice the trains along the same avenue. In only the densest places in the world, like New York, is that sensible, and even so, most cities don’t do it.

Instead of making 4-track lines, what world cities with better transit systems than Washington enjoy is just more lines, period. You can shut down a line much more easily when there’s another one nearby. Back to New York, for instance, the tunnels between Manhattan and other boroughs are 2-track, but there are many parallel ones.

If the A train is under repair, the trains could travel on the F line instead. When the L tunnel has to be shut down for Sandy-related repairs, it’ll be horrible for residents of Williamsburg and Bushwick, but at least they can transfer to the G train to go around to another East River crossing.

When Chicago shut down its Red Line for months, it was able to set up bus service to get people to the parallel Green. Fewer parts of the DC Metro have alternate lines nearby.

 

[PleaseBlitz]

Metro, if it had the funding to keep up with maintenance, could be an awesome system.  It,unfortunately, is not.  

 

My biggest gripe about not staying open for Caps playoff games is it just makes the city look bush league.  This should be a no brainer.  

[thebluefood]

26 minutes ago, PleaseBlitz said:

Metro, if it had the funding to keep up with maintenance, could be an awesome system.  It,unfortunately, is not.  

 

My biggest gripe about not staying open for Caps playoff games is it just makes the city look bush league.  This should be a no brainer.  

Well, maybe that's changing somewhat now that Virginia, Maryland, and the District signed bills dedicating funding to WAMTA a couple months ago

http://www.thehoya.com/historic-agreement-guarantees-dedicated-funding-wmata/

 

Quote

Maryland lawmakers joined the governments of Washington, D.C., and Virginia yesterday in a final approval to jointly provide up to $500 million annually to fund the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority in a historic funding decision that could boost the floundering system’s recovery efforts.

The Virginia general assembly pledged $154 million per year to Metro funding on March 7 on the condition that Maryland and D.C. also increase their contributions. Mayor Muriel Bowser (D) pledged $178 million per year in her State of the District address on March 15.

The decision was part of a negotiation between Virginia, Maryland and D.C.’s whereby each party would provide the $500 million that Metro’s leadership argued is necessary to make Metrorail a world-class system.

The funding will be used to combat longstanding failures within the Metro system by improving rail cars and buses, replacing older equipment and catching up on delayed repairs across the 50-year old system.

The joint provision marks the first time Metro has had a stable source of funding since it was established in 1967. In the absence of a dedicated funding source, Metro has relied on the D.C. local government and seven other local and state jurisdictions for funding. Each government calculates its funding contribution based on population density, average weekday ridership and the number of stations operating in each region.

 

Hopefully they don't screw that up, too. 

 

Completely agree on not staying open for the Caps playoff game, though. D.C. Metro Area is one of the largest in the U.S. and yet we're depending on PepCo. and Qatar to stay open for a few hours after a major playoff game. Everyone's having a laugh at Metro - and D.C. as a sports town - over this and rightfully so. As I've said earlier: we're not a little town between Richmond and Baltimore anymore. We shouldn't be doing this. 

[PleaseBlitz]

40 minutes ago, thebluefood said:

Well, maybe that's changing somewhat now that Virginia, Maryland, and the District signed bills dedicating funding to WAMTA a couple months ago

http://www.thehoya.com/historic-agreement-guarantees-dedicated-funding-wmata/

 

 

Hopefully they don't screw that up, too. 

 

 

Unfortunately, because Rest-of-Virginia state delegates hate NoVa, the state legislature rejected a plan to raise taxes in order to raise new funds for Metro.  Instead, Virginia is sending funds to Metro that were already earmarked for other Metro improvements in Virginia.  So they are basically robbing Peter to pay Paul.  

 

https://wtop.com/virginia/2018/04/va-house-gop-rejects-tax-increases-metro-voting-take-money-northern-va-transportation-projects/

Edited May 17, 2018 by PleaseBlitz

[Renegade7]

 

Anyone ready to change their vote now?

Edited May 17, 2018 by Renegade7

[spjunkies]

No excuse for a public transportation system in a major area like this to shutdown at 12 during the week and 1 during the weekends. The system has turned into a total embarrassment. 

[BenningRoadSkin]

20 hours ago, No Excuses said:

It has been crumbling badly since 2012. IMO that’s when we started getting consistent track fires and weekly delays during peak hours. Which ultimately led to the “safetrack” project in 2016.

It was in bad shape throughout the aughts but the Fort Totten disaster is what exposed it.

 

They built the system and did minimal maintenance for 30 years

9 hours ago, spjunkies said:

No excuse for a public transportation system in a major area like this to shutdown at 12 during the week and 1 during the weekends. The system has turned into a total embarrassment. 

Metro's problem is that its beholden to 3 different jurisdictions, with two of them having their capitols being nowhere near the place that needs the system.

 

I have no idea how they can alleviate at that other than Fed government intervention.

[thebluefood]

Bumping this because I had a chance to use Baltimore's light rail for the first time a few days ago. It was a weekday afternoon, heading to and from Camden Yards, and I liked it. Really hope the Purple Line in MoCo/PG County works out. A light rail into the District from Suburban Maryland would be pretty sweet, too, especially if Metro can't get its **** together. 

[PleaseBlitz]

https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/trafficandcommuting/new-problems-for-the-silver-line-phase-2-officials-say-rail-ties-are-flawed/2018/12/11/6517bb24-fca3-11e8-ad40-cdfd0e0dd65a_story.html?utm_term=.92961cba870b

 

Quote

Hundreds of concrete rail ties installed at track crossovers along the second phase of the Silver Line are flawed, officials say, a problem that could further delay the multibillion-dollar rail project that is already 13 months behind schedule.

 

Railroads have been around for nearly 200 years.  How ****ing hard can this be?

[spjunkies]

FINALLY some good metro news.

 

Quote

WASHINGTON (FOX 5 DC) - After years of a shortened schedule, late-night Metro rail service could be making a make a comeback. Currently, Metro closes at 11:30 p.m. during weekdays and at midnight on weekends. However, after a Metro board vote on Thursday, Metro’s hours could be expanded next summer – with Metro closing midnight during the week and 3 a.m. on weekends. Metro's proposal to keep the current schedule will likely fail, according to D.C. Councilmember and Metro board chair Jack Evans.

 

http://www.fox5dc.com/news/local-news/late-night-metro-service-likely-to-return-dc-councilmember-says

[CousinsCowgirl84]

I don’t have to use the metro but a few times a year,  mostly on the weekends, but i like it. It sure beats the heck out of driving around in DC.  I’m  all for tolls to find infrastructure projects, it’s a no brainer.  

[spjunkies]

Metro is trash and so is the D.C. government.  You've had two years to supposedly "fix" the system and you need more time? Keep running the system like we're in Wisconsin.

 

https://www.bizjournals.com/washington/news/2019/02/28/metro-board-votes-to-keep-its-current-hours.html

 

Metrorail hours will remain the same for another year.

 

After weeks of heated debate over whether to return Metro to its late-night hours, the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority board hashed out a deal in closed session Thursday to maintain the system's current hours until July 1, 2020. They later publicly announced their 7-1 decision to keep Metrorail closing times at 11:30 p.m. on weeknights, 1 a.m. on weekends and 11 p.m. on Sundays.

 

The opposing vote came from D.C. representative Corbett Price. Board Chairman Jack Evans, the Ward 2 council member who represents the District alongside Price, changed his stance and voted to keep the earlier hours, yielding to his colleagues in Maryland, Virginia and the Federal Transit Administration.

 

Evans had previously been pushing to return to late-night hours even in the face of the FTA’s threats to withdraw up to $1.6 billion in transit funding to all three jurisdictions over safety concerns. FTA funding relies on required maintenance upkeep that WMATA has performed at night ever since Metro hours were cut a couple of years ago.

“I don’t know if anything convinced me," Evans told The Washington Post after Thursday's vote. "I just recognize the state of our system.”

 

Under the new measure, Metro will revert to late-night hours — midnight on weeknights and Sundays, 3 a.m. on weekends — on July 1, 2020, unless the board takes further action, according to the Safety and Operations Committee's report.

[BenningRoadSkin]

 

5 hours ago, spjunkies said:

 

Metro is trash and so is the D.C. government.  You've had two years to supposedly "fix" the system and you need more time? Keep running the system like we're in Wisconsin.

 

Why are you blaming the DC Government only? WMATA is also funded by VA and MD. 

[spjunkies]

17 minutes ago, BenningRoadSkin said:

 

Why are you blaming the DC Government only? WMATA is also funded by VA and MD. 

 

You're absolutely right, that should be the wmata board of directors is trash. My fault.