The cost of funding Metro service may be one of the issues taking center stage in this year’s race for Arlington County Board.
The five candidates on the Nov. 4 ballot have a variety of competing views on how much, if any, additional local funding should be provided for regional transit service.
New tech allowing Metro users to pay their fare by tapping debit or credit cards is receiving good grades from local leaders.
At a meeting last week, representatives on the Metropolitan Washington Area Transit Authority (WMATA) board of directors said the new “Tap-Ride-Go” initiative will benefit both regular and infrequent users of the regional system.
Arlington’s representative on a panel studying D.C. Metro funding is opposing a region-wide sales tax to support the transit system.
Instead, County Board member Matt de Ferranti believes Virginia, D.C. and Maryland should each determine how they will pay for the extra regional costs now estimated at $500 million to $600 million a year.
Changes to Silver line service and less frequent Blue and Yellow line trains are scheduled for this weekend due to planned track work.
Trains between Pentagon City and Reagan National Airport will run every 18 minutes on Saturday and Sunday. Additionally, the Silver line’s eastern terminus will be in New Carrollton instead of Largo.
A new long-term “blueprint” to dramatically expand Northern Virginia’s bus rapid transit lines calls for significant investment along core Arlington routes.
A draft Bus Rapid Transit Action Plan, unveiled yesterday (Wednesday) is meant to guide agencies throughout the region as they consider future transit investments. A proposed map of possible BRT lines envisions two routes connecting Columbia Pike to Crystal City and D.C., and another route running east from Falls Church into Rosslyn, across the Potomac River and into Georgetown.
A stricter policy on banning riders from the Metro system has some leaders optimistic about better safety in Northern Virginia.
Beginning June 2, the policy will allow the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority (WMATA) to impose longer bans on people arrested for sex crimes or assaults on Metro employees and customers.
A stretch of 12th Street S. in Pentagon City will be off-limits to drivers for about a year as the county extends a bus rapid transit corridor.
Closing the street during the expansion will be safer and allow the work to be completed more quickly, county staff said during a March 11 briefing of the county’s Transit Advisory Committee.
Two men are facing allegations of assaulting first responders in separate incidents in Virginia Square and Pentagon City last week.
The first incident started around 4:30 p.m. Friday, a block away from the Virginia Square Metro station. A shoplifting suspect led officers on a brief foot chase, fled on a Metro train, exited at East Falls Church and then ran on the tracks before being taken into custody nearby, according to Arlington County police.
Overwhelmingly positive public feedback greeted a $177 million plan for an additional entrance to the Ballston Metro station last night.
Dozens of residents joined representatives from developers and civic associations at a presentation on the planned entrance at the southwest corner of Fairfax Drive and N. Vermont Street.
Plans for a new $177 million west entrance to the Ballston Metro station are beginning to solidify.
Proposed plans for the project, meant to reduce congestion and improve access to areas west of the station, were published last month.
Metro train traffic was halted near Ballston after an armed man reportedly fled into the tunnels.
Police were dispatched to the 7-Eleven store across Fairfax Drive from the Ballston Metro station around 2:50 p.m. for an armed robbery. Initial reports suggest that a man robbed the store of wine, and pulled out a gun when confronted.
Mary Hynes admits to being a late bloomer on transportation and transit issues.
“I did not start out as a transportation person — at all,” she acknowledged.
