WMATA

The convenience of taking Metro just got easier for college students with a U-Pass SmarTrip card. As of January 19, eligible students at participating universities can add their U-Pass to Apple Wallet on iPhone or Apple Watch to use on Metrorail or Metrobus. It’s quick and easy to do. Just add the U-Pass card to Apple Wallet, and there’s no more plastic to carry around.

After you add a U-Pass to your Apple Wallet, you can toss out the card or keep it as a souvenir. The physical card will no longer work when transferred because all the content is now available through your U-Pass in Wallet on iPhone or Apple Watch.  Students at participating schools can use the mobile U-Pass just like a physical card at any of Metro’s 97 rail stations in DC, Maryland and Virginia and all Metrobus routes. Just hold your iPhone or Apple Watch near the card reader on the faregate or farebox to pay with U-Pass. With Express Mode, there’s no need for Face ID, Touch ID or to unlock the device.

Metro has filed formal petitions for reconsideration of Washington Metrorail Safety Commission (WMSC) directives that remove certified operators from service and stalls the previously agreed upon 7000-series Return to Service plan.

Train service on the Blue, Orange, and Silver lines will be reduced for customers, from every 15 minutes to every 25 minutes, beginning Tuesday, Jan. 17, through most of the week. The move is required to comply with directives received at 4:30 p.m., Friday evening of the holiday weekend from the WMSC. No Red and Green line service impacts are expected. “Safety is an absolute core value of Metro; however, we are exasperated with directives that are not based on risk analysis or facts,” said Chair Paul C. Smedberg. “The Board has tremendous confidence in the job our General Manager and his team of operations and safety professionals are doing, as evidenced by significant improvements we have seen in safe and reliable rail service.”

Starting Monday, three new escalators will be up and running at L’Enfant Plaza Station following eight months of construction that closed the north entrance at Maryland Avenue and 7th Street SW. The project, completed on budget, will provide better, more reliable escalators for customers and includes the latest safety features and LED lighting. The reopening of the north entrance will also restore the connection to Virginia Railway Express (VRE) and the closest Metro entrance for government agencies, office buildings and some of the most popular museums on the National Mall.

During construction, Metro’s contractor, Kone, removed all three escalators at once. New concrete encased support beams had to be installed before replacement work could begin. Each escalator is custom built to fit the entrance and is industrial grade, designed to be more durable for the weight and traffic of a busy station. The completion of the north entrance escalators is part of a seven-year project to replace 130 escalators by 2028 and brings the number of escalators replaced in the past two years to 39. Work will begin next year to replace the remaining six escalators at L’Enfant Plaza’s two other entrances.

Per MCDOT: Red Line Trains will be single tracking between the Silver Spring and Forest Glen stations due to leak mitigation work. The work will take place between Saturday, December 31 through Monday, January 2.

Per Metro: Metro has transitioned to a new program of preventive maintenance and planned capital work. Overnight and weekend hours will be used for enhanced preventive maintenance including cable testing to prevent smoke and fire incidents, stray current testing, trackbed cleaning, switch maintenance, torqueing (tightening fasteners, joint nuts and bolts) to eliminate excessive strain on infrastructure, and track geometry work to ensure the correct rail alignment.

Per WMATA: Nobody likes to be ghosted, especially by a bus. So, it’s good news for Metrobus customers that “ghost buses” have been banished by recent technology upgrades at Metro. Today, Metrobus customers have more certainty that the location of a bus displayed on busETA is accurate. Previously, all scheduled buses were displayed on busETA regardless of whether a bus was in service or not, meaning that a bus taken out of service for a mechanical issue, operator availability, or other issue would be displayed on busETA but would not show up for an expecting customer.

“These upgrades to busETA are part of our commitment to listen to customer concerns and work as hard as possible to improve their experience using Metro,” said Metro Senior Vice President of Bus Services Leroy Jones. “Ghost buses are one of the biggest frustrations we hear about the Metrobus experience, and this change will help take the guesswork out of planning your trip.” Customers using busETA whether on their desktop computer or mobile web application will already notice the improvements. Customers that rely on displays at bus stops will see similar improvements in the coming weeks.