Many Bus Schedule, Fare Changes This Week
Many route changes and a few fare increases take effect in the Washington region starting today. Metrobus and the suburban bus systems start their fiscal years on Wednesday, and most of these changes reflect their budget problems.
Most bus services were able to dodge the bigger cuts that their financial planners proposed this spring. But the changes still are quite significant. In fact, there are too many to absorb in one blog posting, so in most cases, I'll give you links to the new schedules and further information. In some lucky cases, you'll find there's extra service. In others, a route may be operated by a different service.
Metrobus
The transit authority's bus fleet is involved in many of the changes. For example, the transit authority says it is discontinuing the C7, C9 (Greenbelt-Glenmont Line) because of low ridership. Same with the L7 (Connecticut Avenue-Maryland Line), but the L8 rush hour service on the same line will become more frequent.
Here's a list of changes by jurisdiction, with links.
The District
B9 Fort Lincoln Shuttle Line
Maryland
J7, J9 I-270 Express Line
L8 Connecticut Ave-Maryland Line
Virginia
10B Hunting Towers-Ballston Line
15M George Mason Univ-Tysons Corner Line
16Y Columbia Pike-Farragut Square Line
21C and 21F routes are discontinued.
Arlington
22B Pentagon-Army Navy Drive-Shirley Park Line: The route will be replaced Monday by Arlington Transit (ART) Route 87. Find all ART schedules on this page.
Fairfax Connector
The connector is picking up some routes and discontinuing others. Also, there's a fare increase to $7 on three routes that go beyond the county boundaries.
On Monday, service on these Metrobus lines will be replaced Connector routes 466 and 630 through 653:
2W Vienna-Oakton Line
12A, 12E, 12F, 12G Centreville South Line
12C, 12D Centreville North Line
12L, 12 M Little Rocky Run-Vienna Line
12R, 12S Stringfellow Road-Vienna Line
20F, 20W, 20X, 20Y Chantilly-Greenbriar Line
Use this link to see all the service changes involving the Fairfax Connector.
Montgomery County Ride On
The county bus system is not imposing the extensive service cuts proposed this spring, but it is increasing a couple of fares. Route 93 and Route 96 will now charge regular fares and Route 70 will charge express fares starting Wednesday. Read more about those fare changes here.
Reminder
The biggest change of all this week is the scheduled return on Wednesday of Metro's NextBus system, which will allow riders to get current information on when their buses will arrive at about 12,000 stops across the region.
VRE Up, Too
Meanwhile, fares on Virginia Railway Express are going up on Monday by 6 percent. See details here.
By
Robert Thomson
|
June 28, 2009; 11:10 AM ET
Categories:
Advisories
,
Commuting
,
Metro
,
transit
| Tags: Arlington, Dr. Gridlock, Fairfax, Montgomery, Washington, bus service changes
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Posted by: onesugar1 | June 28, 2009 3:02 PM | Report abuse
They cut back on the 16Y?! Why?
As it is, it doesn't run late enough in the mornings from Virginia, or late enough from the city at night. The ride home is always packed.
Posted by: chunche | June 28, 2009 5:03 PM | Report abuse
Did you report that to Metro, onesugar? The restrooms are supposed to be available to customers.
Posted by: chunche | June 28, 2009 5:04 PM | Report abuse
The FFX Connector Express bus from Reston-Crystal City will go up from $3 to $7 each way. That's an increase of about 130 percent. Fairfax County loves to bellyache about how they're broke all the time, where's all the money going? Oh yeah, that brand-new facility on West Ox Rd. that's bigger than most universities. Was that really necessary?
Posted by: mvm_ffx | June 28, 2009 6:26 PM | Report abuse
You referring to the FFX County Government Center? The place that we outsiders refer to as "the Taj Mahal"?
Posted by: thetan | June 29, 2009 2:32 PM | Report abuse
The comments to this entry are closed.
While riding the metro rail on 12/3/08, I had to use the restroom, I asked three employee's of the station if I could use it, I was told so many times No, I pleaded with them and said that it is a emergency, I messed on myself in front of them, they laughed and I had to go home smelling like that, it was unbelievable of what I went throught that day. I am an 65 year old senior citizen, not just because of my age, but if an emergency comes uo Metro should at least let, people with children, and senior at least use the restoom,this incident happen on 12/3/08