"We're able to absorb these kinds of transportation problems better than other places because we have a workforce that is more capable than other regions to engage in telework," Scribner tells Reason. There are a couple of reasons why traffic volumes have remained below-average even with a barely functional Metro system, says Marc Scribner, a transportation policy analyst at the Reason Foundation (which publishes this website). That's up from the week prior to the Metro meltdown, when traffic congestion was at 19 percent of 2019 levels. last week was about 7 percent below 2019 levels. But even that appears to be an overestimate.Īccording to GPS manufacturer TomTom, traffic congestion in D.C. would see only about an additional minute of travel time if 25 percent of transit riders switched to driving alone. A Vanderbilt University study predicted that San Francisco and New York would see commute times increase by 16 minutes and 11 minutes, respectively, if 25 percent of transit riders were to switch to single-occupancy vehicles.
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Between a collapse in transit ridership, rising auto sales, and the lingering health concerns people might have about riding on crowded buses and trains, they feared near-impassable freeways. Some transportation researchers were musing that a carpocalypse could strike many American cities as we extricated ourselves from the pandemic.
#To materialize free
A number of solutions were floated to mitigate this seemingly inevitable "carpocalypse," from stepped-up bus service and emergency pop-up bus lanes to free bikeshare rides. The sudden reduction in rail service had initially sparked fears that as riders opted to drive to work instead, the result would be intolerable levels of traffic congestion. That's the lowest level of ridership since Metro rail service began in 1977. As of last week, that number had fallen to around 126,000-around 28 percent of 2019 November ridership levels. The return of its 6000-series vehicles-which were yanked from service last year after several train decoupling incidents-will also be delayed, thanks to a shortage of available parts caused by global supply chain problems.Īverage weekday boardings on Metro rail were north of 200,000 the week before the 7000-series cars were taken out of service. So WMATA still has no timetable for bringing back the 7000-series cars. But even if that proves successful, the process of taking the cars out of storage and making them ready for revenue service again will take time. WMATA has started a new, stepped-up inspection schedule that it hopes will soon let these trains safely carry passengers once again. Hopes that this problem would be fixed relatively quickly were dashed today when the Washington Metropolitan Transportation Authority (WMATA), which operates Metro rail, announced that the elongated waits would continue until December 31. A problem with wheel assemblies on the 7000-series cars was causing a mounting number of derailments. That's because 60 percent of Metro's train cars are out of service. Despite a near-total collapse in the area's Metro rail transit system, traffic volumes are actually below pre-pandemic congestion levels.įor the past month Metro has been running much-reduced service, with 20- to 24-minute gaps between the trains on most lines. Washington, D.C., is providing a case study in why these fears are overblown. One persistent fear over the last 18 months is that a post-pandemic reopening of offices paired with an unwillingness of office workers to return to taking transit would lead to a "traffic apocalypse" of clogged roads and nightmarish commute times.
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