HOW DO U THINK METRO HANDLED TUESDAY SERVICE?

[wmata employee]

 How do u think we handled the crowds?
Did we frustrate you in anyway?
Did u see employee staff at all stations were your questions answer in a respectful matter?
What did u think we should have improved ?
How long did u wait for trains ?
Do u think we did a good job with shuttle buses?
What was your problem at any metro station or bus stops?

[Tristan]

Would've been nice if local regular routes were actually running on a Saturday schedule like the website said instead of a weekday schedule.  On the bus side, as usual, Metro did a relatively awful job, at least on the local side (this is coming from an employee of another transit system, not just an average Joe Commuter).  That 75% on-time performance rating is a crock of shit when Metro's standard for "on time" is within 20 minutes of scheduled time (at least, that's what Customer Service has said several times).

[79MetroExtraMD]

Would've been nice if local regular routes were actually running on a Saturday schedule like the website said instead of a weekday schedule.  On the bus side, as usual, Metro did a relatively awful job, at least on the local side (this is coming from an employee of another transit system, not just an average Joe Commuter).  That 75% on-time performance rating is a crock of shit when Metro's standard for "on time" is within 20 minutes of scheduled time (at least, that's what Customer Service has said several times).

Better than here where most lines get headways of 30 mins from 7pm, some even of upwards to an hour. And yes, no kind of on-time performance seen here let alone any kind of efficiency.

[Tritransit Area]

With all the packed buses, it might not have been a bad idea to borrow some of MTA Maryland's artics (if not all of them - how many do they have anyway)?  Would've helped with crowds on the B30.

I did kinda cringe when I saw a picture of a New Flyer on the X2...that must have been rather packed!

[Perry]

Just from the sounds of things, it sounds like bus coordination could have been A LOT better.  The local jurisdictions did their part to funnel the crowds to the Metro (Ride On, PRTC, Fairfax Connector), but it sounds like a lot was left up to the rail to do its part.  So many roadways were being left open to the buses that it seems rather silly that the only extra service that was provided was to corridors that had service available to it.  Maybe more Metrobuses could have been sent further inbound instead of adding insult to injury at the rail stations since the localities were feeding into them so much.

It seems that more express service or at the very least more park and ride shuttles could have been worked out. 

I don't know, I sort of wish for this moment I was working for PRTC so I could have heard the coordination meetings, but it sounds like certain aspects were pushed to the wayside.

OTP is measured within 20 minutes? ROFL.  At 20 minutes most transit systems would be at 100% and they're only at 75% with that measure?

[Tristan]

I'm not sure if it's absolutely factored that way, but I know Central considers a bus late after 20 minutes.

I didn't even know about this until I saw them yesterday morning, but we actually ran express buses all the way into downtown from King St Metro.  I haven't yet gotten to that day to find out how many people patronized the service, however, but I know it wasn't a huge dent - granted, our buses were full, but it would take a mile-long convoy of our 38-passenger buses to equal the capacity of an 8-car crush-loaded train.

We ran on Saturday schedule but with reduced headways and expanded service span...we ended up pulling out only 5 buses less than a regular weekday, with all the stages and shuttles factored in.

[WayneNYC]

From the rail side, I think they did well considering the amount of people they moved and so on.  There were lots of employees on hand to advise passengers, encourage them to move down the platforms etc.  The police would stop passenger traffic at some choke points when platforms got too crowded.  At Gallery Place I think it was a wise decision to turn off the escalators and have passengers walk.  They did some small things that in my opinion helped like calling for people with day passes to flash their pass and walk through the gate rather than using the regualar fare gates.

We had planned to get off at L'Enfant Plaza, but at the time trains weren't stopping there.  I decided to ride over to the Pentagon and possibly walk across the bridge, but as we arrived at the transit center, there was a line of free shuttle buses to take people over to 14th Street.  On the return trip, I was prepared to do lots of things to avoid the heavy crowds transferring at downtown stations like riding the Yellow then Green up to Fort Totten to get a Red line train to Shady Grove.  However, when our Yellow line train arrived at Gallery Place the platform wasn't bad at all so we transferred to the Red line there and again, it wasn't too bad.  I think a big part of this was the crowds were very orderly and cooperative.

I do think WMATA should've done more with the buses to help out rail. 

I was expecting the worst and was pleasantly suprised (except the guy at Shady Grove who wrongly said the parking lots were full).

[79MetroExtraMD]

As for the bus side, at least with Greenbelt, I think most of the extra B30s were probably from operators who finished their runs on the R12, V12, T16/17, etc who were about to pull in. Those 4 tics did help out the crowd but with the mix of motorcoach buses, PG, and Metro buses in the same lanes, it was chaos. It took some time just to get around Greenbelt Station loop to exit out of the station.

[rideonrulez]

As for my observations being at Shady Grove almost all day, WMATA did an ok job with the rail. But I have 2 gripes, 1) They were turning people away saying that parking was full at the station though it clearly was'nt. 2) Damn WhyMATA (Q2) buses keep parking in the Ride On bays and blocking the bus lane up at Shady Grove West and the worst part was the street supervisor was standing there and did'nt do S**T!! Then again this is on a daily basis they do this.... 

[Perry]

All the more reason to kick the Q2 out of Shady Grove and have them short turn at Rockville or MC.

During special events at Franconia Springfield, we used to have an awful time with Fairfax Connetor because we'd try to queue at the beginning of the bus bay lane but their buses would continue to sit there blocking us in even though the agreement was that they'd stage elsewhere. 

At least everyone has 4 years to fix the issues they ran into this time around.  I don't think any service could go perfectly, but some of the things done seemed so last minute and thrown together.

[WES]

This event was something unusual and something that might not happen again BUT.......

1)If I am correct on the website it said that these "SPECIAL" bus routes were going to be limited, but they weren't.  If they were going to be limited they should have been.

2)I share Tristan's gripe about buses running on Saturday schedules and to my surprise seeing the F14 running at 8am in the morning and D1s running in the evening.

3)I think to limit the load on metrorail (I guess this applies to more MD than VA), that they should have used park and ride lots and used express buses into downtown.  I think, if I am wrong VA had this set up (probably because all of the bridges in VA going to DC were closed).

4)Better coordination between the local T/As and metro and maybe borrow more local T/A buses and maybe MDMTA AND express buses to ferry people to and from the inauguration instead of doing it themselves.

5)Prevent parking on the streets so that metrobuses can pull to the curve to pick up passengers instead of have the buses block the street and people walking into the street to catch a bus, blocking traffic causing traffic jams.  Also along that note have a specific place for pickups.  There were 70s loading people on both sides on H Street, instead of loading them from one side of the street.  Having temporary bus stops would have helped also, they still have hubcaps that they can use can't they.


This isn't a metro thing but more of a DC/Fed thing.  Next time block off more a 5 block perimeter around the parade/inaugural sites, to only allow buses/police/other emergency vehicles/other authorized vehicles into that area, so getting in and out would have been smoother than it was on Tuesday.  STUUUUUUPID people driving downtown, clogging traffic.  H Street was HORRIBLE Tuesday evening trying to get out.

[Tristan]

Contributing to the shittiness I've already commented on, I'm hearing that we actually ran a special shuttle not to downtown Washington or to a subway station to drop inaugural visitors off, but...

From King St Metro to Seven Corners SC...introducing the DASH AT28A. 

That's right, good ol' WMATA missed a trip on that hourly route, we had extra stage buses in place, there were "many" people waiting, and the route serves a good bit of Alexandria, so ... welcome aboard special Inaguration Day-only service to replace failed Metrobus operations.  Too bad we can't do it every day of the year.

[Tritransit Area]

NICE....

That's some great customer service you guys have over there.

[LandoverDivision]

HAHA. The day before Inauguration, the whole downtown D.C was jammed. Gallery-Place, Union Station, Metro Center everywhere just about. It took me damn near two hours to get home due to slow traffic and f***ing roadblocks and shit. I'll never do that again. Metro handled it well from my point of view. When you have damn near 2 million people crowding the damn city, there's not much you can do to stop it. Kudos to Metro!

[WES]

Contributing to the shittiness I've already commented on, I'm hearing that we actually ran a special shuttle not to downtown Washington or to a subway station to drop inaugural visitors off, but...

From King St Metro to Seven Corners SC...introducing the DASH AT28A. 

That's right, good ol' WMATA missed a trip on that hourly route, we had extra stage buses in place, there were "many" people waiting, and the route serves a good bit of Alexandria, so ... welcome aboard special Inaguration Day-only service to replace failed Metrobus operations.  Too bad we can't do it every day of the year.

*Shakes head*

All I can say is wow.  I'm speechless otherwise.