Metro Considers Cutting 3am Service

Photo by DC Metro People on Flickr.

GW students already love to complain about the Metro's inconvenient closing times - 12am Sunday through Thursday, and 3am on Friday and Saturday.  Concertgoers, bar-hoppers and clubbers frequently find themselves sprinting to the station in hope of catching the last train, only to be rewarded with locked gates and an expensive taxi home.  If plans considered at last night's WMATA board meeting move forward, students may find themselves in the back of a cab on a much more regular basis.

Facing a yawning $72.5 million budget deficit, the beleaguered transit agency has been left to drastic measures to keep itself solvent.  Closing the Metro at 12am all week, as opposed to 3am on Fridays and Saturdays, would save Metro $5 million a year.  

Board members also emphasized the additional time for maintenance work that such a schedule would afford.  Bringing weekend closing back to midnight would had 40-45 days of track repair to the calendar, lessening the the need for mid-day single tracking and other service disruptions.  Deputy General Manager for Operations Dave Kubicek was quoted in the Examiner as saying that the change would be like "adding an eighth day to a seven-day workweek.

Residents and students alike expressed concern with the proposed change. ESIA Junior Aria Varaseth emhpasized the reliance cost-conscious students placed on late operating hours: "Whether we're going to parties, clubs or galas, it's important to have that extra option...GW's 4-Ride service can only do so much.  To take that option away is a slap in the face to students from GW, American, Howard and Catholic..."

Local businesses and clubs are similarly livid.  Ward-6 Councilman Tommy Wells, who is also on the WMATA board, told TBDNews "We’re a world-class city...[t]o be a world-class city you have to support nightlife. We don’t shut the lights off anymore at 5:30 in Washington. It does not make sense to believe Metro is merely for commuters."  He has also asked restaurants to calculate the cost of decreased service hours on their businesses.

No decision on the proposed cuts has been made, and alternative plans included replacing late-night rail services with bus lines. Concerns exist, however whether the bus proposal or the city's stock of taxis could handle the more than 13,000 passengers who ride the trains during extended hours each Friday and Saturday.