Updates: D.C. Metro shutdown

SILVER SPRING, MD-MAR 16: Lines for buses throughout the morning were voluminous but not overwhelming. The Paul S. Sarbanes Transit Center normally services both bus riders and Metro riders as the two entities share the transit hub in downtown Silver Spring. Today however, it was bus riders only as the Metro train system is down for a security check. (Photo by Michael S. Williamson/The Washington Post)

After more than 24-hour hiatus, Metrorail service will resume at 5 a.m. Thursday morning, officials announced at an evening press conference.

But riders should be aware that there still may be service delays. Metro General Manger Paul J. Widedefeld that while the majority of the 600 cable installations have been inspected, repairs are still being made. If the fixes are not completed by the start of rail service, officials may single-track some trains or provide bus bridge between stations where work is still to be completed.

Traffic around the region was mixed on Wednesday with some drivers reporting lighter than usual traffic. Other modes of transportation, including app-based services such as Uber and car-sharing services such as Car2go reported brisk business. Cyclists also said there were above normal levels of two-wheeled commuters zipping around the region’s vast network of bike lanes. Capital Bikeshare had offered free 24-hour memberships during the Metro shutdown.

Check here for an account of how the region coped with the shutdown. For update Thursday Metrorail service and other tips for getting around, check the Dr. Gridlock blog.

How smoothly traffic is flowing along Rock Creek Parkway near the Kennedy Center.

The volume is substantial, but unimpeded by snarls or tie-ups. Cars roll quietly along , most with nobody inside but the driver.

This may be subjective, but those behind the wheel seem calmer, less weary than usual at day’s end. One might almost detect signs of satisfaction at having dared the threat of chaos and won.

A couple of Ubers, and a couple of taxis, but mostly private cars. In one cab, the driver, grins at something apparently said by his white-haired passenger. Someone in an Uber with a West Virginia plate has his arm draped over the outside of the back door, looking around with interest.

The sun is setting behind the towers of Rosslyn, across the Potomac.

Rowers in 8 pared shells glide up and down the river. Traffic on the nearby Roosevelt Bridge is moving swiftly and smoothly in both directions.

The early evening temperature is warm and pleasant.

Given all these sights and the seeming serenity who would not wish for more such days?

Here’s what Metro inspectors found during emergency inspections of power cables:

The evening rush in central Washington had swaths of misery, as ever, with some places hit harder than usual and others sputtering along as they do daily.

For instance, commuters complained that one major artery cutting through the Shaw neighborhood, Rhode Island Avenue NW, was more awful than on a typical weekday. Traffic cameras confirmed their pain, showing cars limping through seemingly endless lines of congestion around 6 p.m.

Meanwhile, some roads further west trudged along as normal, unstuck but still unpleasant, including stretches of Florida Avenue and Columbia Road.

“We have a couple that are normal, we have a couple that are a little heavier than normal, and we have a couple that are lighter than normal,” said Lt. Sean Conboy, a D.C. police spokesman, just after 6 p.m., summing up the mishmash.

More than 200 police officers and a contingent from the Department of Transportation have been having some success directing traffic through bad spots, he said, and he’s heard of no reports of bike or pedestrian accidents, a major focus. “It’s going well,” he said.

An aide holds up a photo of a track damaged by fire as Metro General Manager Paul Wiedefeld, left, speaks during a news conference to announce that Metrorail would  be shut down for a full day at  Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority headquarters on March 15 in Washington. At center is D.C. Council member Jack Evans. (Evan Vucci/AP)

Metro officials said that rail service will reopen  at 5 a.m.  Thursday but that Metro may institute bus bridges and single tracking in some areas as crews continue to conduct inspections and make repairs.

Metro General Manager Paul J. Wiedefeld said that roughly 80 percent of the inspections had been completed and that 26 problem areas were identified.

On Tuesday, Wiedefeld stunned the region when he announced the total shutdown of Metro’s rail operations. The news left thousands of commuters and schoolchildren scrambling for a way to get to work and school and back home again. But Wiedefeld said the closure was needed to give crews time to conduct emergency inspections of 600 track-based power cables — the same cables that burned during last year’s fatal Yellow Line incident.

A Mazda  Zipcar vehicle sits parked in one of the company’s spaces in Washington, D.C.,   on Jan. 2, 2013. (Andrew Harrer/Bloomberg via Getty Images)

The shutdown of Metro’s rail system  Wednesday forced many area residents to find alternative ways of getting around. And it looks like car-sharing service Zipcar was one of the beneficiaries.

Officials at the company said they had their best Wednesday ever — with a nearly 50 percent increase in reservations compared to a typical Wednesday.

“It’s the highest utilization on a weekday that we can remember,” said spokeswoman Lindsay Wester  in an email. But despite the bump in business, Wester emphasized that the company thinks that D.C. works best when people have a “wide variety of mobility options,”  and hope Metrorail will be up and running soon.

Of the more than 800 Zipcar vehicles in the D.C. area,  more than 170 are near Metro stations.

Wester said that for folks still looking for a way home, Zipcar does offer an overnight rate of $29 for a rental that will run from 6 p.m. to 8:30 a.m. Wester said some cars also are being offered at special rates during the Metro shutdown.

[So what is Zipcar all about?]

Many buses were full  Wednesday, which also is typical of a normal weekday in Washington. (Michael S. Williamson/The Washington Post)

Metro officials have scheduled a 6 p.m. news conference to update the public on the status of Metro service.

On Tuesday, Metro’s General Manger Paul J. Wiedefeld shocked the region when he announced the total shutdown of Metro’s rail system beginning at midnight Tuesday so that crews could conduct emergency inspections of 600 track-based power cables throughout the system. At the time he said he hoped officials could resume rail service  Thursday, but whether they will be able to remains to be seen.

In an early afternoon update, Metro officials said that half of the 600 cables had been inspected and six had been replaced.

Wiedefeld called for the inspections after  a fire early Monday just west of McPherson Square. The incident, which delayed service for riders on the Blue, Orange and Silver lines, seemed to echo the deadly calamity  Jan. 12, 2015, near Metro’s L’Enfant Plaza station. An electrical malfunction on tracks near the station that day filled a tunnel with smoke, engulfing a stalled Yellow Line train in fumes. Scores of passengers were sickened and one died of respiratory failure.

On Tuesday, Wiedefeld said that while the risk of another incident was small, it was too risky to delay the safety checks.

“While the risk to the public is very low, I cannot rule out a potential life-safety issue here, and that is why we must take this action immediately,” he said in making the announcement.  “When I say safety is our highest priority, I mean it. That sometimes means making tough, unpopular decisions, and this is one of those, for sure. I fully recognize the hardship this will cause.”

The Maryland Department of Transportation is lifting HOV restrictions along I-270 and U.S. 50 for this evening’s commute.

The agency said it is lifting the restrictions to reduce traffic congestion due to the fact that more vehicular traffic is expected as a result of the Metro shutdown.

The restrictions will be lifted along eastbound U.S. 50 between I-95 and U.S. 301 in Bowie, and northbound I-270 between I-495 and MD 121. Normal HOV restrictions will resume at 5 a.m. Thursday, MDOT said.

Traffic control officers are fanning out along major roadways to guide drivers out of Washington, including allowing them to go through some red lights, D.C. police said.

But  contrary to some reports, police said, that only applies to places where an officer is standing there directing you to go through.

See the full story.

More than twice as many bicyclists and pedestrians crossed the Key Bridge between Rosslyn and Georgetown this morning as normal, numbers from Arlington County’s automated counters show.

The number of pedestrians on the bridge between 6 a.m. and 10 a.m. reached 1,379, and 933 bicyclists crossed as well. Nearby, the Rosslyn Bikeometer along Lee Highway recorded 857 trips during the same four-hour period. That’s twice as many as were recorded Tuesday.

Bike and pedestrian counts on Arlington’s large number of automated counters tend to start rising in March, as weather becomes more reliable and people are tempted to try non-Metro commutes. Given the Metro shutdown Wednesday and the 70-degree weather, more people apparently took the challenge.

Metro’s Wednesday shutdown was precipitated by a predawn fire on Monday in a tunnel near the McPherson Square station. General Manager Paul J. Wiedefeld called the fire “disturbingly similar” to the deadly smoke incident in which a woman died near L’Enfant Plaza in 2015, and he said he doesn’t want to risk another such tragedy. Here’s a look inside the smoke and fire defects that paralyzed the Metro system.

Note: to use the 360 functionality, use your cursor over the video above to scroll around the room. If you’re viewing on a mobile device, open the link in the YouTube app.

With the morning rush over, we’re shutting down our Metro shutdown liveblog for now. Go here for the latest updates. And here’s how to get around today.

Trevor Maurer had no idea Metro was closed. (Victoria St. Martin)

Trevor Maurer had no idea Metro was closed.

The 28-year-old bopped into a nearly deserted Shady Grove station just after 10 a.m. Wednesday and stopped dead in his tracks. His orange headphones dropped out of his ears and nearly fell to the ground as he stared at the closed sign above in disbelief.

“My heart sunk, and then I got really nervous,” said Maurer, who lives in Gaithersburg and works as a waiter at a country club restaurant in Bethesda. “How am I getting into work?”

When Maurer rode the Metro on Monday, he didn’t see any postings about a closure. And while he believes in safety, he said he really wishes Metro officials “got the word out to everybody a little bit better than they did.”

“I don’t regularly check the website, and I assumed on a nice day like today there’s no reason to check it for weather outages or anything,” he said.

Maurer takes the Metro pretty much every day. But he was off yesterday, so he didn’t ride.

And he won’t be riding today.

“Now I guess I have to get an Uber to get into work,” he said. “That’s the only thing I can do right now.”

Update: By 10:20 a.m., the accident had been cleared and traffic was moving freely.

A crash on the inner loop of the Beltway in Virginia near the Springfield interchange has backed up traffic for about two miles. The two left lanes are blocked by emergency personnel.

Cars heading into D.C. are stuck, with some trying to dart into open slots in adjacent lanes but ultimately making little progress.

There was at least one person injured in the crash, but no further details were immediately available. Some lanes were getting by.

[Crash on inner loop of the Beltway at Springfield Interchange]

On the Maryland side of the Beltway, there are backups on major feeder roads running through commercial and residential areas such as New Hampshire and Georgia Avenues.

A commute around the Beltway that took about an hour between 5 and 6 a.m. was elongated to nearly two hours after 7 a.m. because of the volume and slowdowns.

Taxi cabs are expected to see a jump in business with Metro closed Wednesday. (Nikki Kahn/The Washington Post)

Taxi driver Yalemsew Zegeye, 28, of Hyattsville, thought the Metro shutdown might make for good business.

It was not so. He netted only a handful of customers during the morning commute. He said he started at the Fort Totten Metro station, but the cab line there barely moved, so he headed downtown.

Zilch.

“So far, it’s not that much different,” from a normal day, he said, as he drove through Cleveland Park and Woodley Park areas on Wednesday. “Probably I didn’t get the right location or something.”

“For me it’s normal,” he said. “I don’t see that much difference…taxi jobs most of the time are chance.”

He said there are thousands of taxis in the city and plenty of competition from ride-sharing services like Uber.

He said he thought many people stayed home rather then try to get to work.

Finally, he said, after waiting at the Marriott Wardman Park Hotel for 20 minutes, he got a good fare: a group of tourists headed to the zoo.

Jessica Williams wasn’t going to take Metro anyway: Monday’s electrical fire in a tunnel was too much.

“I was petrified to hear it. It just terrifies me to know I could have been underground and things are catching on fire and it’s so hard for people to get to you. It’s just horrible,” said Williams, 24, a cashier at the Washington Hospital Center gift shop. “When I hear fire—my mom was killed by fire. When I hear fire, I turn into a different person.”

Her mother was murdered and set on fire in 1997, Williams said. “I don’t do fire.”

Williams had always used Metro. It’s an easy ride from Anacostia to the Shaw/Howard University station on the Green Line. But on Wednesday she and her son were taking the bus.

“It makes you really want to go and get a friggin’ drivers license and get a car,” Williams said.

While Beltway commuters were delayed earlier during the rush-hour on the Montgomery County side of the highway, it is now drivers in Prince George’s County dealing with the irritation of stop-and-go traffic.

On the inner loop, there are significant delays past Branch Avenue toward the Woodrow Wilson Memorial Bridge. Meanwhile on the outer loop past Andrews Air Force Base, red brake lights shine in succession as roadwork gets underway and Maryland State Police stop speeding drivers.

Some of the delays appeared to be rubbernecking and residual backups from earlier crashes. Traffic was back up to speed once drivers got past a crash on the shoulder near Central Avenue.

Fairfax commuters wait for the VRE. (Antonio Olivo/The Washington Post)

Some commuters in Fairfax County rerouted their trip to the Virginia Railway Express commuter train line after learning that their local Metro station was closed. Ted Pluchinski, a government contractor in Crystal City, waited for a VRE train at the Lorton station, slightly annoyed that his trip to work has been stretched by another 15 minutes. “It miffed me a bit yesterday because I didn’t hear about it until I was on the train ride home last night,” Pluchinski said about the Metrorail shut down, standing in his business suit on the drafty VRE train platform. “But it is what it is.”

At Union Station, the Metro escalators were running, so every once in a while Wednesday morning, someone would step on. One man, seeing the shuttered entrance down below, tried to turn around but got stuck, backpedaling in place as he climbed up while the escalator chugged steadily down. Most just popped up on the other side from the “up” escalator, and rushed to the cab stand.

Many people just walked after getting off their MARC and VRE trains, rushing, annoyed that they would be late. Others welcomed the fresh air after their train ride, and said they had started walking in good weather anyway after hearing about smoke, fire and other safety scares on Metro.

Faith Royce, on her way to work in Dupont Circle, said, “I’ve been trying to swear off Metro as it is, because nothing works. They don’t do basic maintenance.”

She has been trying out alternatives after a string of bad experiences, like taking the Metro from her home on Capitol Hill to Pentagon City only to find, after shopping, that the Yellow Line was shut down. She has been 45 minutes late for appointments because of Metro delays. After foot surgery, she was going to a doctor’s appointment last winter when she got stuck in “not one, not two, but three stations — I couldn’t elevate or escalate out.” She had to cancel the appointment — and took a cab to the next one. Now she’s learning bus routes and trying Uber. “Metro is wonderful when it works,” she said. But it has cost her too much in recent years with delays and breakdowns and unexpected high fares of cabs she didn’t expect to have to take. Now she’s thinking a bus might be the way to go. “I’m fed up with Metro.”

Carlene and Terry Abbott got to Union Station with time to spare for their Amtrak train to New York — because they took a cab. They come to D.C. every March from Nebraska for a national postmasters conference. With a 7-day Metro pass, Carlene has been sightseeing while Terry is at meetings. But when they were walking through the lobby of their hotel in Crystal City on Tuesday, she gasped: On the TV it said Metro would be closed. “Then our folks back home called,” to make sure they had seen, she said.

Their trip over the bridge and up past the Capitol Dome took just 20 minutes despite some traffic. The cab fare was a shame, though, and they were thinking the fares on the way back Wednesday night might be even higher. “We’ll see if people are taking advantage of the situation,” Carlene Abbot said. She was thinking about how many people were inconvenienced by the closure: “700,000 people every day — it’s crazy. That’s a lot of feet, to keep running like they do.” It’s such a convenient way to get around, she said — “other than the other day, when I was out tootling around the city, when the train stopped and I heard there was a fire at the next station.” She made a face; she was thinking, “What would I do if I had to get off? How would I get back?”

Deanna Won, 49, had to get to Union Station to catch a train to Philadelphia Wednesday morning. But when she logged onto the Metro trip planner, the only options it suggested were buses from Arlington. Confused, she called, and learned to her shock that there was no Metrorail service all day. “Wow. We’re in the nation’s capital, and we don’t even have reliable transportation.

“This has been a frustration that has been building,” she said, each time there is a delay or a problem. When she travels to other countries, she always finds a better way to get around there.

By bus, it would take her an hour and a half from Arlington, so she got an Uber, which cost about $24 with surge pricing. “With Metro I’ve been late to important meetings,” she said. “It’s just sad.”

Capitol Bikeshare riders are having trouble finding parking. (Perry Stein/The Washington Post)

People riding Capital Bikeshare into downtown had trouble finding a spot to dock their bikes.

Derek Macabee, 26, took advantage of the Bikeshare program’s 24-hour free membership promotion while Metro is down, and pedaled in from Bethesda.

He liked his first bike commute, but when he arrived to drop of his bike after 9 a.m. at a station on 15th and L streets NW, all the spots were full. Within a five minute span, a half dozen other people unsuccessfully attempted to dock there bikes there as well.

“The weather was nice,” said Macabee. “The ride would be worth it if I could find a place to park my bike.”

Macabee said he’d consider trying to bike again to work — but maybe not in D.C.

“I’m moving soon,” he said. “Hopefully in New York they have more bike stations.”

Capital Bikeshare has three gathering stations in the city with employees onsite, where people can drop off their bikes even if the dock is full. The list can be found here.

At Union Station, Holly Smith started to head out the door to walk to her government  job near Metro’s Smithsonian stop — normally she takes the subway a couple of stops — but it was so dark early Wednesday morning that she quickly decided to wait 20 minutes for a colleague coming in on the next MARC train.

“It’s a ghost town –I can’t walk,” safely by myself, she said.

The Metro announcement kept echoing through the station’s halls as people hurried by.

The train was emptier than usual, she and several other riders said — perhaps half the usual number of passengers when she boarded at 5:12 a.m from Baltimore.

When she heard about the Metro closure, she thought: “Good for them. You caught on fire — that lady died — they had that derailment — good for them. I’d rather be safe than be on the news.”

Uber told its drivers they would be guaranteed $30 an hour between 6 a.m. and 9 a.m. Wednesday, a driver said.

Ben Shafa, 55, hopped in his Nissan Pathfinder at 5:25 a.m. and planned to drive six hours. “Remember, with Uber, there’s a constant job coming up, and they don’t want you to refuse a job,” he said. “So for the next six hours, I am going to be busy, busy, busy.” As soon as he heard Metro was shutting down, Shafa knew he would have a profitable day on the job. “But as a citizen,” he said, “I don’t want the Metro to fall apart.”

— Jessica Contrera

Nicole Eubanks had a plan.

She usually takes Metro from the Anacostia station to Farragut West. But with the shutdown, she tried to get ahead of the madness. She went online to book an Enterprise CarShare parked in her neighborhood, then left the house at 7:30, half an hour earlier than normal.

The lights of the Nissan Sentra near the Big Chair public art installation in Anacostia went on, but the engine wouldn’t start.

So she rebooked another car over by Navy Yard. To get there meant walking to the bus stop, and waiting.

“We’ve just got to pack a lot of patience. I thought I brought mine,” said Eubanks, 40, who works as administrative assistant. “I thought I was going to be out of this part of the city by now.”

After Metro’s electrical fire near McPherson square Monday, Eubanks had avoided the train on the commute home Tuesday.

“It kind of shook me up, because I’m so close to McPherson Square. I’m like, I’m not sure. I’m going to hop on the 30 bus,” she said.

Her thoughts, like those of so many, were on the deadly L’Enfant Plaza smoke incident last year. “It was scary. I was like, Not again. We’re still just getting over the last incident,” Eubanks said.

She’s hoping Wednesday’s extreme measures are a sign of progress.

“Something needs to be done. When they announced the big shutdown, I was like, Maybe we’re getting to the cause of all this,” she said. “I don’t have a vehicle. This is my transportation for everything, business, pleasure, fun, all of it. I rely on Metro.”

It usually takes her about an hour to get to work, but 50 minutes into the commute on Wednesday there had been essentially no forward progress.

As she watched the cars inching out of Anacostia, she imagined the backup she’d soon hit on the other side of the Anacostia River. She said the manager of the nonprofit group where she works downtown understands what’s happening. They do job training for people on public assistance.

“It might be a little empty, because a lot of them do rely on Metro,” she said.

Passengers are told to exit the bus after a D.C. Circulator breaks down at 16th and K Streets. (Fair Siddiqui/The Washington Post)

As she opened her doors near McPherson Square, a D.C. Circulator driver warned passengers they might not all fit. The bus was brimming with riders.

“Everybody’s not gonna fit,” she said. “The bus is full.”

“This is bad,” she added as she started driving. “Don’t worry about the fare,” she told passengers.

A short while later, it became clear something was wrong. The bus began sputtering at 16th and K streets NW. Then it came to a stop.

“Oh, Jesus,” a woman gasped.

It was the third D.C. Circulator to break down in a single day for Sarah Singha, 39, who takes the MARC train from Baltimore. Two other Circulators broke down before leaving Union Station, she said.

“This is the third one I waited for, and this is now down,” said Singha, who was trying to get to Georgetown. Instead, she was told, along with the other passengers, that she had to get off.

“The MARC train is never a problem,” she said. “It’s always a problem when you get into D.C.”

After about a five minute wait, the bus started up again, and passengers — including Singha — reboarded, hoping to make it to their stops.

Remember when this little black Fiat carrying Pope Francis caused worries about traffic in September? (Andrew Harnik/Associated Press)

Transportation officials were watching traffic with some trepidation Wednesday morning as Metro’s shutdown promised to add hundreds of additional vehicles to area roadways. And it reminded them of another time the D.C. area dealt with a snafu in Washington’s transportation modes — Remember that little black Fiat?

[How one little black Fiat stopped D.C.’s transportation woes — at least for a couple of days]

When Pope Francis visited D.C. last fall, Washington was on high alert for traffic woes for several days.

That huge visit underwent “months and months of planning and preparation and messaging,” said Taran Hutchinson, a spokesman for the Metropolitan Area Transportation Operations Coordination (MATOC).

But the decision to close down Metrorail for a 29-hour period because of safety concerns came without warning. MATOC found out the same time most everyone else did, late Tuesday afternoon when Metro made the announcement.

“On this, we had only 12 hours to prepare,” Hutchinson said. “It was dropped on us like everybody else.”

[Questions on cables’ safety demand 24-hour Metro shutdown]

At Virginia’s Department of Transportation, officials said Wednesday morning that they were closely monitoring traffic from an operations center in Fairfax and were ready to make adjustments to lanes and signals as needed. Like many other road experts, they were hoping many workers would opt to telework.

“We’re just preparing for the worst,” said Jennifer McCord, a spokeswoman for VDOT.

Quentin Liggins was taking it all in stride, listening to his music and drinking coffee. There were back-to-back buses shuttling down Connecticut Avenue, meaning more empty seats than usual for his morning commute. Liggins, 27, who works for a nonprofit education organization near Dupont Circle, said he didn’t mind the extra time it would take him to get to the office because it’s for a good cause.

“I know a lot of people’s lives are being affected today, and I feel for them,” he said. “But this is something we need to fix, even if it takes six months to a year. Everybody needs to be safe.”

Sitting nearby, Senate staffer Mary Thomas was checking emails on her phone, resigned to an hour-long, two bus commute — about twice as long as her usual straight-shot ride on the Red Line. But she wasn’t worried about showing up late on the Hill.

“My boss knows and understands, so I’m grateful,” said Thomas, 28.

House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee Chairman Bill Shuster (R-Pa.) said he may hold a hearing on the surprise shutdown of the Metrorail system.

“We support any necessary actions to ensure the safety of Metro riders. These safety issues have been a long-standing concern,” Shuster said in a statement Tuesday evening. “We will closely monitor developments and assess the need for any additional steps, including a potential hearing.”

Rep. Barbara Comstock (R-Va.) added that “Metro management throughout the entire system needs to be shaken to its core and be rid of its culture of incompetence.”

Along with Rep. Donna F. Edwards (D-Md.) and D.C. Del. Eleanor Holmes Norton (D), Comstock was behind a measure last fall giving Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx control over safety oversight at Metro.

Wendy Hancock stood on the corner of Connecticut Avenue and Porter Street in her green coat and sunglasses and her right hand in the air to hail a cab.

It was about 8:10 a.m., and she had to be in Rosslyn by 9.

“If I’m late, there’s not much I can do, “she said.

She said she normally was a Metrorail or bus rider.

“I’m not frustrated — yet,” she said, standing near the Cleveland Park Metro stop.

She had been waiting about 15 minutes, her hand in the air as traffic whizzed by.

“I’m happy that they’re checking on our safety, “she said of the Metrorail shutdown. “They’re more concerned about people right now, and that’s good.”

“Inconvenience factor, not giving people a lot of time, that was a little annoying,” she said of the decision, which wasn’t announced until after 4 Tuesday afternoon. “But in the bigger scheme of things, it will be okay. You know you’ve got to roll with the punches in life.”

Hancock, who works for an international science museum association, lives in Cleveland Park. She said her street about four blocks away is empty of the cars usually parked there by people who ride Metro.

“It’s like a ghost town, like a Sunday morning, “she said. “It’s abandoned. It’s kind of nice. ”

One cab stopped with someone already inside.The driver asked where she was going but pulled away after she said she was headed to Rosslyn.

She was the only person out on the avenue in the area hailing a cab at that time. There had been many empty cabs earlier.

“That’s what always happens,” she said. They disappear “as soon as you need them.”

Finally a cab slowed and stopped.

“Sweet, “she said, and hopped in and joined the traffic flow.

As the S9 bus approached the stop right before Military Road, about 30 people waited to board.

The driver stopped a little past the bus shelter, opened the door and announced the bad news before anyone could board.

“Maybe three people. Three people!” she yelled. One. Two. Three people entered — the last, an elderly woman. “There’s no seat for her?” someone asked.
No, and no room for the two people with her. Slowly, she got off the bus. And Elmer Chavez took his chance.

“Okay, come on in,” the driver told  him.

“Thank God!” said Chavez, hurrying to board.

Chavez had already waited 20 minutes to board this bus. He looked at the clock. It’s 8:15, and he was luckier than the two dozen others left behind. If there was any consolation, another bus was right behind.

The ride was slow going along 16th Street NW, and riders called into work to say they would be late.

Unless a passenger rang for a stop, the full bus just continued on, leaving commuters behind, hoping the next bus would have space for them.

At Columbia Road, one person got off.

“One person. Only one,” the driver told the dozen folks waiting.

The bus kept moving down 16th Street.

Near U Street, five people exited.

“Not normal. Definitely not normal,” said Fatou Jack, 57, a sigh of relief on her face as she exited the bus.

“It was slow but a smooth ride,” said Jack, a nanny who commutes by bus daily from Silver Spring to U Street. At least she was able to get a seat.

Kuing Hu calls her boss to tell her she’s stuck at Largo Town Center without an easy way to get the work at a Washington hotel. (Feint Nirappil/The Washington Post)

Kuing Hu stepped off the 26 bus and walked into the Largo Town Center Metro station as she does most days to catch a train to the Washington hotel where she works. Only when she walked in and saw it was deserted and all the rail entry points closed off did she realize something was amiss.

“Oh my God…” she muttered.

A station official stepped out to explain the system was closed and to offer alternatives. Hu, who doesn’t speak English well, hadn’t watched the news or noticed messages about the shutdown on her commute home on Tuesday.

Low-wage workers like Hu who can’t telecommute, take costly cabs or lose a day of wages are hit hardest by Metro’s closure.

“If I need to pay more money, I cannot go to work,” Hu responded when presented with options for multiple bus transfers or hailing a cab.

“It’s just today? Emergency?”

Outside, she called her manager trying to get the day off. The manager was quick to tell her to find a way to work.

“If I take a taxi, it’s too many money from Largo Center to D.C., maybe $100,” she shouted.

As a bus to Addison Road approached, she hopped on to figure out a connection. She didn’t have much choice.

Tim Sheetz figured with Metrorail service closed on Wednesday, there might be more than a few folks be looking for a way to get to work. So the Mount Rainer resident offered up the empty seats first to his co-workers at an events planning company in Northern Virginia and then to his neighbors.

“With Metro rail being closed tomorrow, I am offering a ride share option to any fellow residents,” he wrote in a post on the Mount Rainer Facebook page. “My path with take me & u thru the city, down the I-66 corridor to Fairfax (Fair Oaks to be exactly). My car can take 3 neighbors to any of the Metro stops along that path. I will be leaving Mount Rainier about 7:00 am.”

And while he didn’t get any takers for a ride to Virginia, he figured it was worth it to make the offer.

“I just thought it was the right thing to do,” he said.

Sheetz, 41, said the drive usually takes about an hour and 15 minutes. On Wednesday, he left a little later than usual — thanks to the new puppy that recently joined the family — but said that just after 7 a.m. traffic seemed to be slightly heavier but nothing too dramatic.

“There’s definitely traffic, but it’s nothing I’m not used to,” he said. “We’ll have to see. I haven’t even hit 66 yet.”

Lobbyist Patrick Wilson says he has a scheduled breakfast with House Speaker Paul D. Ryan (R-Wis.) Wednesday morning.

He didn’t want to risk getting stuck in traffic, so Wilson, 43, hopped on a Capital Bikeshare near his Logan Circle home to ride to Capitol Hill in his suit and tie.

“I’m improvising today,” he said. “I have napkins so I can wipe my brow if I get too sweaty.”

But Wilson said he likely won’t bike all the way. The Capitol is, after all, on a hill. He doesn’t want too arduous of a workout before his big breakfast.

“I figure I’ll bike as far as I can downhill, then get off my bike and walk uphill,” Wilson said.

A bike commuter in Bethesda. (Nick Anderson/The Washington Post)

Some saw the commuting mess as an opportunity to get some exercise.

Scott Harris, 50, of Chevy Chase, was on the Capital Crescent Trail Wednesday morning, riding toward Capitol Hill with a satchel on his 21-speed REI road cycle.

Sometimes he bikes, sometimes he drives, sometimes he rides the Metro. “It’s a good excuse to get back on the bike,” he said.

On Tuesday, he drove to work.

Surveying the cycling traffic on the trail, he said, “This looks kind of heavy to me.” But it was nothing compared to Wisconsin Avenue, jammed with cars, a couple of minutes away.

“I’ve got options, so it’s okay for me,” Harris said. “Doesn’t bother me too much.”

From the Lincoln Memorial:

From 12th Street and Madison Drive NW:

Riders wait for buses at the Silver Spring Metro Station. (Michael S. Williamson/The Washington Post)

Telecommute, telecommute, telecommute. That’s the words of the day as Metrorail is shutdown.

“For us to be able to handle this as a region, people have to telecommute,” said Kanti Srikanth, head of the Transportation Planning Board for the Metropolitan Washington Council of Governments. “Clearly during the peak period, our road system does not have the capacity to handle many more vehicles. If people decide to drive, we don’t have that capacity. We have to hope that a large number of people will decide to work from home.”

The federal government agencies is open Wednesday, but employees have the option for unscheduled leave or unscheduled telework. The Greater Washington Board of Trade also urged businesses to give workers flexibility to work from home.

Bus service was being added throughout the area but many buses are already at capacity.

The Fairfax Connector, which is providing shuttle buses to the Pentagon in addition to it regular service, warned riders that buses are likely to experience delays due to increased traffic congestion and crowding.

“Commuters are urged to allow extra time for their commute as traffic congestion is expected on all routes tomorrow,” the agency said late Tuesday.

Read more here.

Traffic has slowed to a crawl in the Montgomery stretch of The Capitol beltway near Takoma Park #adaywithoutmetro pic.twitter.com/5bFBOKsf3J

— Arelis R. Hernández (@arelisrhdz) March 16, 2016

What appeared to be a not-so-terrible commute on the outer loop of the Capitol Beltway has now turned into a creeping slog right where one would expect it: approaching Silver Spring.

Commuters are inching along at about 5 to 10 mph with blinding sunlight filling rearview mirrors.

Commuters on the lookout for breaks in the congestion will be disappointed at the interminable rows of vehicles that can be seen snaking around curves and up inclines on the roadway.

A packed Metrobus to downtown Washington is barely moving in bumper-to-bumper traffic from downtown Silver Spring.

The crowd aboard this S9 bus is not that unusual for one of the busiest and most popular bus routes to the District. But Wednesday morning, riders’ patience was tested even more.

Traffic appeared to be slowing the ride significantly. Getting across a long block to the 16th Street circle took 15 minutes.

“Its chaos,” said a rider. Another called in to work to say things weren’t looking good and she was going to be late.

“I’m stuck in the traffic. I just wanted to let you know I don’t know how long it will take me to get there,” a woman on her cellphone said. “Thanks for understanding.”

The Verizon Center along Seventh Street NW. The Washington Wizards are playing Wednesday night as Metro is shut down. It is likely to pose a challenge for the many fans who typically use the rail system. (Toni L. Sandys/The Washington Post)

And to add to Wednesday’s traffic and commuting woes — the Washington Wizards will be playing tonight at the Verizon Center.

The team is set to play the Chicago Bulls at 7 p.m., and plenty of game goers who typically use the Gallery Place/Chinatown Metrorail station will instead be trying to find parking spaces or using buses, taxis or ride-share programs.

Three women from the Hyattsville Kingdom Hall-Jehovah’s Witness congregation proselytize outside the Takoma Metro on clear days. But they  found far fewer people to talk to Wednesday, so instead they helped stymied commuters on their more earthly ways.

“Are you trying to go downtown?” one of the women asked a man who was staring blankly at a Metrobus timetable outside the station. She pointed him to the 63 bus; he trotted off gratefully.

“We are multitasking,” said the woman, who declined to give her name. “Usually we are trying to help people with a longer journey.”

Swathi Siris was stranded. She had no idea that Metro was completely shut down and was taken by surprised when she stopped a WMATA worker to explain the closure.

“What’s happened?” she asked.

She was in a panic. She usually takes the Orange Line from Vienna all the way to New Carrollton.

“I thought only one single lane was going to be closed, so I figured it would be running less frequently, but I didn’t think it was totally shut down,” she said.

She started to walk out of the station in a hurry. She had no more time to talk. She had to make a call to make other plans.

“My mind is blocked,” she said, her eyes showing her shock.

Stop-and-go traffic has begun on the outer loop of the Beltway in Prince George’s County near exit 11 for Upper Marlboro. The slowdowns are intermittent and short-lived for much of the ride until commuters reach the area near FedEx field in Largo.

The delays are becoming progressively worse the further commuters move north through the county. Speeds have been reduced to about 20 miles per hour, and commuters are crushing their brakes for several miles.

The heaviest volume in this stretch of I-495 heading from Northern Virginia is now pressed between Bladensburg and the Montgomery County border.

Will Bennett viewed the day’s unusual Metro closure with a soldier’s resolve. The Army trooper who stood at a bus stop in Vienna was bound for his desk at the Pentagon, his camouflage rucksack packed for a normal day at work.

“There’s nothing to do about it,” Bennett said. “It is what it is. Complaining does nothing to change the situation. Just got to figure it out and move on.”

Suzanne Dee, by the same stop, decided to carpool Wednesday.

“It definitely changed my plans in a couple ways,” she said.

Jeremy Hunt is biking to work for the first time Wednesday. He would like to be wearing a helmet, but he just found out Metro was shutting down last night, so he didn’t have time to purchase or borrow one in time.

Just after 7 a.m., he left from his Bloomingdale house to grab a bike from a nearly empty Capital Bikeshare station across the street and began the trek to his office in Crystal City.

“I told my boss I’d be coming in wearing jeans, and those were my terms of coming to work,” said Hunt, who wore bright yellow sneakers with his denim.

Hunt, who usually takes Metro to work, said he didn’t mind biking to work too much.

“It could be worse,” he said. “It could be raining,”

With Metro shutdown for the day in the nation’s capital there was plenty of chatter on social media about how people were dealing with it and getting around town.

Among the hashtags being used — #metrogeddon, #metroshutdown, #makeamericalateagain, #ADayWithoutMetro —

https://twitter.com/DC_Prepster/status/710063173588615168

And NYC took a chance to comment on Metro’s day-long shutdown —

Another image gained some comments — how Metro announced its closing for the day at a news conference Tuesday afternoon.  That’s Metro’s board chairman Jack Evans at the podium with Metro’s General Manager Paul Wiedefeld to his right. And Metro’s chief spokesman Dan Stessel holding the sign.

A woman walking to the entrance of Largo Town Center asked two station officials waiting outside the door how to get downtown.

The station manager pointed to the sign announcing the closure of the entire Metrorail system all day. Shortly after 7 a.m., fewer than a dozen people were waiting for buses at the center.

“I know it’s closed! I thought they’d have a bus going downtown,” responded the woman, who didn’t want her name published because she works for the government.

“They were supposed to,” a WMATA official responded, telling the women her only option was to take a bus to Addison Road and connect to downtown and urging her to order a Lyft or Uber instead.

“It would have been so simple just have a bus going downtown,” the government worker grumbled as she walked away. Another woman walked passed her holding out printed directions for driving to Foggy Bottom.

Metrobus riders lined up for the bus early Wednesday the Friendship Heights station. For some, it was their first ride on the bus in months. For others, it was their usual commute.

With no Metrorail system available all day, many commuters are taking the bus to get to work. Some D.C.-bound buses were reported to be full in busy corridors from Northern Viriginia to Silver Spring.

“It’s always busy,” said Maria Peña, a regular rider of the 30 bus line down Wisconsin Avenue NW. “But today I am seeing a lot of new faces.”

Some bus stops across the Washington region appear to be busier than usual by 6:30 a.m. At the Silver Spring transit center, scores of riders lined up to board one of the S buses to downtown, already one of the busiest bus lines connecting Maryland communities to D.C. Metro said it was providing extra service on the S9 limited-stop bus.

In Arlington, the first 38B out of Ballston to downtown Washington was full, riders reported on Twitter. Metrobus said it was sending extra buses to accommodate the high demand.

Some riders said early Wednesday they had to add lots of extra time to test a new bus commute but choose that option over driving, knowing what the roads would look like Wednesday. Others said they could take the bus for a few days as long as the system gets fixed. But they said they worried that one day may not be enough to do the work.

“I don’t mind a couple of days of inconvenience if they actually get it done and it will be safer,” said Jamie, a State Department worker who got a ride from Bethesda to Friendship Heights where she boarded the bus to Foggy Bottom.

“I applaud the sense of urgency,” she said. “They have crashes. They have fires. So I would like them to get it done and soon.”

Andre Lang, 37, waits for his ride to the Dirksen Senate Office Building at Largo Town Center. His company had to arrange for him to get to work. (Fenit Nirappil)

At 6:40 a.m., Yinka George pulled his Mercedes Benz to the curb of the entrance of Largo Town Center and hopped out to ask the only person in sight if there was a bus he could catch to L’Enfant Plaza.

“A bus? Man, you are on the wrong side of town. To go to L’Enfant Plaza you better be in downtown DC. You out in downtown Maryland!” responded Andre Lang.

“But I have to get the work,” responded George, who was wearing a crisp violet buttondown shirt and polished dress shoes.

“Guess you better drive that Mercedes Benz to L’Enfant Plaza,” Lang quipped.

George, 42, turned to get back in his car. He figured his other option was ordering an Uber or Lyft.

“It’s kind of ridiculous trying to find a way out there,” George reflected. “I didn’t make proper plans.”

Lang picked up his phone and finally heard from his ride. The 37-year-old had been waiting 30 minutes for someone to drive him to the Dirksen Senate Building where he works as a chef.

“Usually the cabs are all lined up,” said Lang, who normally parks in the Largo center lot and catches a train. “The train is usually packed right now, and all the people that ain’t on the train right now are on those roads.”

He’s glad his company is sparing him the gas money and white-knuckled commute on clogged roads.

Without the Metrorail system in service Wednesday, the morning commute could be chaotic with clogged roads, crowded buses and more cyclists on the road, transportation officials warn.

“For us to be able to handle this as a region, people have to telecommute,” said Kanti Srikanth, head of the Transportation Planning Board for the Metropolitan Washington Council of Governments. “Clearly during the peak period, our road system does not have the capacity to handle many more vehicles. If people decide to drive we don’t have that capacity. We have to hope that a large number of people will decide to work from home.”

Federal government agencies will open Wednesday, but employees have the option for unscheduled leave or unscheduled telework. The Greater Washington Board of Trade also urged businesses to give workers flexibility to work from home.

Still, Wednesday’s commute won’t be normal. Drivers should expect heavier traffic into the District and bus riders could not only face slower commutes, but also more crowded buses. The D.C. Department of Transportation said it is adding traffic control personnel at some locations to help direct traffic and will monitor traffic flows throughout the day. The agency will also suspend rush hour construction when traffic is expected to be heavy.

The local transportation agencies Tuesday evening were still juggling to assess whether they would be able to provide extra buses to accommodate extra riders. But many of the local bus systems don’t have the capacity to add hundreds of extra buses and hundreds of extra drivers, so they urged riders to be patient Wednesday. Many of the region’s transportation officials didn’t find out about Metro’s plans until just minutes before the announcement was made Tuesday afternoon. With such short notice, they said they had no time to prepare and their hopes Tuesday was that an increase in telecommuting would help the region from having a messy commute.

“That is the only way the region can handle something like this,” said Srikanth. “People have to telecommute or carpool, vanpool or take federal leave. But we should expect more people trying to take buses, if it is an option available to them. VRE and MARC commuter trains will be crowded. All of these are expectations.”

Except for the American Art Museum and the National Portrait Gallery, all Smithsonian museums are shuttered until noon. Those two museums regularly open at 11:30 a.m. The National Zoo is also open on its normal schedule.

Due to #MetroShutdown our DC museums will open at noon today, except for @americanart @NPG & @NationalZoo which will open on time

— Smithsonian (@smithsonian) March 16, 2016

Commuters are now experiencing the first delays of the morning rush-hour in separate stretches along the Beltway.

On the inner loop from Montgomery County into Prince George’s County, traffic was clear but a few slowdowns emerged as drivers lined up to take exit ramps leading to Washington. Commuters near the exits for the Baltimore-Washington Parkway, U.S. 50, I-295 and Pennsylvania Avenue need to watch out for the sometimes abrupt slowdowns of drivers trying to move over to those exits.

Across southern Prince George’s County nearing the National Harbor, heavy volume will have commuters dropping their speed to about 30 mph. The local lanes headed onto the Woodrow Wilson Memorial Bridge are particularly congested but the few-minute delays at the 6:30 hour are manageable.

All along the route, state highway signs are encouraging commuters to carpool or telework as they are expecting many more drivers than usual on major roadways.

Arit Essiene was supposed to be taking a midterm exam Wednesday at the University of the District of Columbia School of Law.

But on Tuesday, the first year law student from Alexandria learned that her test date was changed because of the Metro closing.

“I can’t believe it, my professor has rescheduled the test,” said Essiene, who normally would be taking a Metro train from Alexandria. “Praise God.”

At the other end of Metro’s Yellow and Green lines, David Dillard, a Voice of America worker, was also enjoying a quiet morning. He normally arrives at the West Hyattsville Metro Station by 6 am.

But this morning only Ann Dillard, his wife, was stirring at their Hyattsville home because David chose not to deal with seeking alternative transportation.

“He is still sleeping. He took the day off,” whispered Ann Dillard as she quietly prepared for her day as a public school teacher.

Metro General Manager Paul Wiedefeld at a news conference Tuesday to announce Metro’s shut down for Wednesday. (Evan Vucci/Associated Press)

The following is from Post columnist Petula Dvorak:

We really didn’t need this.

Not right in the middle of our shamefully ugly presidential election season. And not right after our humiliating ice storm meltdown.

We were already international laughingstocks. Now Washington gets to endure an unprecedented Metro shutdown.

With little warning, the rail network that spiderwebs beneath the nation’s capital and carries hundreds of thousands of passengers each day announced Tuesday that it would simply close for at least 24 hours.

Good night and good luck getting around. Ride a bike. Or a goat. Or a burro.

Forget Uber. Surge pricing, remember?

Call us Washingtonistan.

Electrical cables. Fire hazards. That’s what the officials said at their astonishing press conference. Okay, okay. Those are scary words.

“While the risk to the public is very low, I cannot rule out a potential life safety issue here,” General Manager Paul J. Wiedefeld said.

Life. Safety.

Got it.

To read more, click here.

Taxi cabs are expected to see a jump in business with Metro closed Wednesday. (Nikki Kahn/The Washington Post)

D.C. taxis will be able to pick up multiple passengers who don’t know each other and are going to different locations on Wednesday, the D.C. Taxicab Commission said.

The commission has authorized an emergency expansion of “shared” riding to be in effect from 12:01 a.m. Wednesday until 5 a.m. Thursday, while the Metrorail system will stay closed. With this temporary change, the commission allows shared rides to be taken from any of the city’s 57 taxicab stands and within one mile of any Metrorail station.

If you take a taxi “shared” ride, here’s how the pay system will work: as each passenger reaches their destination, the metered fare is paid by the passenger exiting the cab. The meter then starts over to the next destination. Taxi driver are required to charge the metered taxicab rates and there will be no additional surcharges.

Because the Metrorail shutdown is expected to place “an extraordinary strain on the local transportation system,” the commission said it found it necessary to issue the change to help “assist commuters, residents, and visitors in the District of Columbia and surrounding communities during the 29-hour shutdown.”

To read more click here.

Capital Bikeshare is likely to see a spike with Metro shutdown Wednesday. (Sarah L. Voisin/The Washington Post)

D.C. cyclists are organizing group bike rides on Twitter with the hashtag #wmatabikepool.

Cyclist tweeted out their commutes Tuesday evening, inviting anyone who is biking a similar route to join them for the ride. Others invited those who will be biking for the first time because of Metro’s closure to ride along with them.

“I bike commute every day & am happy to help new bikes go from Petworth to the Capitol tomorrow ~8:30 am,” Miriam Goldstein tweeted Tuesday evening.

Bike programs, taxis, buses and ride-sharing programs are expected to see surges in commuters with Metro’s daylong shutdown for safety reasons.

Khaled Orebur looked despondent and confused. He normally only takes Metro once a month. Today he arrived at the Vienna stop at 6 a.m. and was turned away at the fare gates by the station manager.

He had planned to take Metro to Union Station and had already purchased advance bus tickets to New York to visit friends.

“I won’t be able to catch the bus,” he said. “I’ll have to cancel the trip.”

Do the right thing and “abstain from fare-increase practices” was the message from the National Consumers League as Washington dealt with Metro’s all day shutdown.

In a statement, the group said, “Many Washington-area consumers are facing a difficult day today, and we urge companies to not further inconvenience consumers who have limited transportation options by charging exorbitant fees.”

It went on, “Just like any other day, consumers will need to get to work, to doctors appointments, and to hospital visits, and many will have to scramble to find ways just to get their kids to school.”

The group said taxis and ride sharing services like Uber should “resist the temptation to take advantage of this unfortunate situation, cap rates, and ensure reasonable accessibility while Metro is out of service due to safety concerns.”

Whether they agree or not, the ride-sharing programs and taxis are likely to see a huge uptick in passengers.

The Wednesday morning view at Metro’s Vienna stop as the rail system is shutdown for the day to deal with safety issues. (T. Rees Shapiro/The Washington Post)

At 5 a.m. at the Vienna Metro stop on the Orange Line, the platform was empty. Station manager Shawn Hall said that only one lone commuter had attempted to enter the fare gates before realizing, in a moment of despair, that the rail system had shut down for the day.

“He walked right past,” Hall said.

Jody Carlson depends on the Metro for her commute to downtown Washington. On Wednesday, she awoke an hour early to take two different buses to get to work.

She sat at the Vienna stop waiting for a bus and planned to switch in Ballston to another one to take her to Farragut Square. Her commute from her home on Fair Lakes will be at least a half hour longer, if not more, she said. To pass the time, she brought along a book, she said. It’s a murder mystery.

Carlson said she could have worked from home but decided to head in, hoping to get more work done at the office without distractions. She said she didn’t fault new Metro general manager Paul Wiedefeld for his decision.

“This GM probably saw this as the least of all evils,” she said. “It’s a safety issue. I respect it because you balance it against the chance of a fire happening again.”

That said, Carlson plans to stick around the office until 6:30 this evening in order to avoid the mad rush home, making her Wednesday one unusually long day.

“This afternoon will be hell,” she said. “It is what it is.”

Megan McDonald is a poet. Her daily commute on the Orange line from Vienna usually provides her plenty of fodder and time to compose her musings. Today, though, the records department staffer at a D.C. architecture association will not be writing one of her daily poems.

“I’ve done enough commuting poems,” she said.

She said her ride time will be doubled by the shutdown. She had printed out the bus schedule from Vienna. At her office last night, her bosses had told workers to telecommute if possible.

“They said, ‘Take your laptops! Take your laptops!'” McDonald said. “I could have taken liberal leave but I’ve got a big vacation in October and I’m not wasting leave.”

That vacation will be for a thrilling four days of poetry readings at the Dodge Poetry Festival in New Jersey, she said.

McDonald said she wrote her best poem after riding the Metro home one day.

She spotted a man with a Tiffany’s shopping bag, a Nordstrom bag and a bouquet of flowers. Right before he stepped off the train, she saw him put his hand into his pocket to retrieve his wedding band, and watched him slip the ring back on his finger.

“He was definitely in marriage purgatory,” she said.

Did she consider giving him the benefit of doubt?

“Nah,” she said.

Approaching the 6 o’clock hour, traffic still appears to be running smoothly on the Capitol Beltway. From the Woodrow Wilson bridge through Northern Virginia and into Tyson’s Corner, there were no major delays or slowdowns.

Nearing the Maryland border in Montgomery County, volume is building but there seem not to be too many cars on the road yet on the Beltway’s inner loop. On the other side, outer loop traffic is experiencing significantly more volume but without delays by 6 a.m.

The Wednesday morning view at Metro’s Vienna stop as the rail system is shutdown for the day to deal with safety issues. (T. Rees Shapiro/The Washington Post)

Amy Kister was flustered.

“Where is the shuttle bus?” She wondered aloud.

Kister usually takes the Orange line to her office downtown but her normal routine was upended by the Metro shut down. Her entire morning had been thrown off, she said, and she didn’t like feeling off kilter.

“Usually I’m at work by 6 a.m.” Kister said. She likes to sit at her desk and read the morning newspaper with her coffee to relax and prepare mentally for the day. “To be calm and collected,” she said.

But not today.

“Now I don’t know how long it will take” to get in, she said. “This is a burden.”

She struggled to locate the right bus stop and was frustrated not to see any representatives from Metro helping to guide confused passengers like her trying to figure out an alternate route.

“This is bad for me,” she said.

About 10 p.m.Tuesday night Montgomery County tweeted that the High Occupancy Vehicle restrictions on Interstate 27 were waived for Wednesday. Waived for both morning and evening.

HOV Restrictions on I-270 have been waived for tomorrow, March 16th, both morning and evening.

— Montgomery County MD (@MontgomeryCoMD) March 16, 2016

Then about two hours later, the county reported that it had changed its mind. The message was: “ALERT: The decision to relax the I-270 HOV restriction has been reversed. HOV restrictions to follow normal procedures Wednesday, March 16.”

ALERT: The decision to relax the I-270 HOV restriction has been reversed. HOV restrictions to follow normal procedures Wednesday, March 16.

— Montgomery County MD (@MontgomeryCoMD) March 16, 2016

The first decision apparently was aimed at making it easier for people to get to work without Metro. Then it was decided that people should be encouraged to car pool, to help reduce the congestion caused by the expected increase in automobile use.

All lanes are clear on Maryland’s Route 210 in a few minutes after 5 a.m..

However, in just 10 minutes the highway volume has increased precipitously. There are no delays so far but already traffic slows the closer one gets to the Capital Beltway exits.

Route 210 or Indian Head Highway is the main thoroughfare for federal workers traveling from southern Maryland and Prince George’s County into the District of Columbia. Road signs along the highway remind commuters that Metro has shut down and that they should expect unusual delays on their way into work this morning.

Down the ramp onto I-495 in Virginia across the Woodrow Wilson Bridge there were no problems as of 5 a.m., but volume was building quickly.

It appears that most early morning commuters who regularly board the southbound 5:17 am MARC train into Washington had stayed home. Only about 20 passengers lined the platform, instead of the usual 80. And just a handful boarded in Odenton, the busiest stop.

Talk was of “jumper cables” and figuring out bus lines. Many had jobs that could not be done from home. “I work at a hospital so there’s no such thing as tele-commuting,” said Donna Dabney, who lives in Catonsville, just south of Baltimore.

Dabney said she usually takes the train in at 7:30 a.m. but grabbed an earlier one so she could be on time to the Veteran’s Affairs hospital, near MedStar Washington Hospital Center in Northwest. She said the D-8 bus, which she took in the last snow storm, usually takes 40 minutes. “I know from experience that it’s a long bus ride,” she said.

Her normal commute is a Red Line ride to either Brookland or Columbia Heights, where the hospital has a shuttle to its campus. She doubted the shuttle would run today.

“I think the shutdown is necessary,” said Dabney, who has works as a therapist and has commuted since 2008. “But they should have given the government more time. By the time they made the announcement many government workers had already gone home and had no time to make contingency plans.” She said she learned of Metro’s closure on the radio news.

Dabney also said the repairs and track inspections “should have been done after the fire that killed that lady, not after another fire.” For this evening, she said she plans to work late and leave “after all the foot traffic has died down.”

Metro is shutting down so WMATA can check the safety of the system’s electrical cables, which caused a fatal incident last year and a fire on Monday.

Some people didn’t quite get that memo, or speculated that it wasn’t the true reason for the 24-hour closure.

When contacted about the Metro shutdown, an FBI spokesman referred calls to Metro, but stated there is no specific credible threat to the Metro system.

Lindsay Wester, a spokeswoman for Zipcar, said the car-sharing service has seen an uptick in reservations. She suspects they come from members who are concerned about getting around on Wednesday because Metrorail is shut down.

She said Zipcar will offer discounts on a couple dozen of its 800 vehicles in the D.C. area — $5 an hour through midnight Wednesday. Those cars can be found by searching by rate online, or by using ZipCar’s app.

Standard overnight rates will be $29 from 6 p.m. to 8:30 a.m.

Wednesday’s Metro shutdown has caused the District to suspend residential street sweeping on Wednesday.

The idea is to “relieve competition for parking spaces” on a day that more people will likely be driving to work and then looking for a place to leave their cars.

So no tickets will be issued on Wednesday  for parking on the normal street sweeping routes, the District’s Department of Public Works said.

However, the department said, other parking violations will be enforced. These include parking for longer than the time limit in residential permit zones, as well as parking at expired meters, at bus stops and at crosswalks.

Uber drivers could be the envy of the Washington region Wednesday. With Metro shutting down for more than 24 hours, Uber is expecting its rideshare business to boom as people scramble to get to work.

Prices, however, will be capped at 3.9 times the normal rate.

That’s potentially good news for riders. When Metro suspended service at a few stations last May, people who opted for Uber reported that prices surged to nearly five times the normal amount.

Read the full story.

For almost four hours Tuesday, D.C. Mayor Muriel E. Bowser offered no public statement on Metro’s unprecedented closure even as members of Congress, the Obama administration and countless irate riders weighed in.

But at a hastily called evening news conference, the mayor said she had been “shocked” to receive a call Tuesday afternoon that Metro would close. Bowser said the shutdown had touched off a round of contingency planning inside the mayor’s office that paralleled preparations for a major blizzard.

“We treat this event, because it is so significant for the District…as a homeland security event,” Bowser said.

The mayor, however, said that despite large numbers of school children and city employees who rely on the rail system, she never seriously considered closing the District government or public schools as a result.

“I take very seriously the job of keeping the District open,” Bowser said, “and a problem on Metro shouldn’t lead to kids not having instruction in schools.”

Bowser said she was not privy to the information that led Metro leaders to close the rail system and that she wouldn’t second-guess the decision until she knew more. But she said she eventually wants to know how Metro arrived at the point of needing a sudden and complete shutdown.

“Do we want to understand their decision-making to get to this point? Of course, and we will get to those answers,” Bowser said. “Some of the questions I will have have to do with what options did they look at to do this? Is a 24-hour or 29-hour closure the only option?”

Bowser also implored city businesses not to gouge customers who may need to rely on Uber or other services as a result of the closure.

“We can get some feedback from Uber around pricing…. We have a little more ability to know what the taxi cabs are doing,” Bowser said. “But we expect our business community to…not take advantage of the situation. And all of our enforcement agencies will be on alert for that,” she said.

The D.C. Department of Transportation said it will add extra personnel to monitor traffic flows and will increase its bus service on Wednesday when the Metrorail system is closed.

“DDOT will fully deploy its resources tomorrow to assist commuters and motorists,” agency spokesman Terry Owens said.

The agency will have traffic control officers and safety technicians at key locations beginning at 4 a.m. to assist with traffic flow, and the traffic management center will monitor traffic cameras starting at 4 a.m. around the District “to identify potential hotspots for congestion,” Owens said.

Three of the six D.C. Circulator lines will provide additional service. Those routes are: Georgetown to Union Station, Woodley Park to McPherson Square and Dupont Circle to Rosslyn. The D.C. Streetcar will run on its regular schedule.

All six routes will be free, to make boarding faster.

Capital Bikeshare also announced earlier that it will offer free 24-hour memberships Wednesday. Fees will still apply to bike trips longer than 30 minutes.

Post technology reporter Brian Fung, who is at SXSW in Texas, said D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser talked about the state of Metro just yesterday at a panel there.

Fung reports that Bowser also said on Monday, “Our Metro is 40 years old, so sort of middle-aged and kind of neglected.”

D.C. police will put dedicated traffic response teams in each area of the District to respond to traffic jams or traffic accidents that might arise.

But Dustin Sternbeck, the head D.C. police spokesman, said it is not easy to predict the impact of closing Metro. He said it will in large part depend on how many federal workers take advantage of the opportunity to work from home.

“The District and its police department have vast experience handling large events that impact traffic,” said Sternbeck, listing the presidential inaugurations, parades and protests that are routine in the nation’s capital. “We will pull from that experience.”

Sternbeck said police will begin monitoring traffic at 5 a.m.

Regular bike commuters from around the region used Twitter on Tuesday afternoon to reach out to people who might want to try biking to work for the first time.

Rallying around the hashtag #wmatabikepool, experienced riders posted proposed meet-ups and routes, with the promise that new riders could join convoys of experienced riders biking downtown from Capitol Hill, Silver Spring, Petworth, Rosslyn and more.

Many meet-ups are departing from Capital Bikeshare stations, to make use of the service’s offer of free 24-hour memberships during the shutdown.

For example, Washington Area Bicyclist Association Executive Director Greg Billing pitched in, offering to shepherd people wishing to ride with him from Petworth.

An aide to Metro General Manager Paul Wiedefeld, left, holds up a photo of a track damaged by fire as Wiedefeld speaks during a news conference Tuesday. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)

Metro passengers and local lawmakers were trying to shake off their shock and plan alternative commutes for Wednesday morning after authorities announced that the region’s sprawling rail system would close at midnight and remain completely shuttered for 24 hours.

The Office of Personnel Management said that federal government employees could telework to avoid what could be crippling traffic jams in the nation’s capital, but several local school systems, including D.C. Public Schools, announced they would remain open Wednesday, posing a challenge for students and teachers who depend on Metro to get to class.

Metro’s unprecedented closure immediately drew complaints and concern. Riders asked why Metro hadn’t announced the shutdown earlier in the day Tuesday to give passengers more time to plan for a midweek standstill, and some said they are worried about what the episode says about the system’s overall safety.

Read the full story.

Arlington Transit will add more bus routes on Wednesday while Metrorail is shut down.

County officials said supplemental service will be added for ART 41 buses between Ballston Mall and Courthouse, to connect with Metrobus from Courthouse to D.C.

Midday service on ART 42 will be more frequent, and ART 43 will operate during off-peak hours. Morning peak service on ART 45 will end 60 minutes later than usual, while evening peak service will begin an hour earlier than usual.

Car-sharing service car2go is prepared for heavier use, spokesman Brad Ducey said.

“We are definitely anticipating high demand for car2go during the Metrorail shutdown. We are staffing up our local fleet team (the car2go folks out in the field that ensure vehicles are cleaned, fueled, and conveniently located) to make sure we’re ready to help our members get where they need to go,” Ducey said.

“WMATA has a long, well-documented list of safety issues and needs to work aggressively to fix them,” said U.S. Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx. “While this shutdown is inconvenient, they are doing the right thing by putting the safety of their passengers and workers first.”

Foxx also used the occasion to urge the District, Maryland and Virginia to step up their efforts to take responsibility for safety oversight of the system. Last October, Foxx took responsibility for Metrorail safety, saying that the previous regional body, the Tri-State Oversight Committee, which included the three jurisdictions, failed to do its job. Currently, the Federal Transit Administration is responsible for safety oversight of the rail system, the second busiest in the country.

“I’ve said it before, and I’ll keep saying it until the region takes real ownership of its safety oversight responsibilities: D.C., Maryland and Virginia need to stand up a permanent Metro safety office with real teeth,” he said. “What are folks waiting for?”

Metro riders have endured troubled commutes caused by switch problems, cracked rails and derailments, among other issues over the years. Here’s a timeline of some of the system’s worst commuter disruptions spanning the past four years: Tracking Metro’s biggest meltdowns

Manfredo Eguez, with his daughter Iris Eguez-Hopkins, was disappointed in the Metro shutdown after spending $245 on Metro passes for the week Tuesday morning. (Moriah Balingit/The Washington Post)

Manfredo Eguez and Karin Hopkins dropped $245 on four all-week Metro passes for themselves and their two children on Tuesday morning, just hours in advance of the shutdown announcement.

The family, visiting from Austin, is staying with relatives in Leesburg and had a week of museum visits and other sight-seeing planned. Their 7-year-old daughter Iris was particularly excited about the Museum of Natural History, which they had planned to see Wednesday.

Standing in Metro Center, the family looked a little forlorn.

“I don’t want to lose my money,” Eguez said, Iris leaned up against his legs. “We are disappointed.”

Hopkins said they planned to figure out how to take a bus into the city. The Metro passes, she said, had been the priciest part of a budget-friendly trip, since they flew for free because Eguez works for an airline.

Anyone can become a Capital Bikeshare member for free for 24 hours while Metro is closed — provided they can actually snag a bike.

The bikes will likely be in high demand with the Metro closed. Capital Bikeshare announced its plan for the unusual day on Tuesday evening.

One-day membership, which gives users free rides as long as the rides are each under 30 minutes long, will be free at all 370 stations beginning at midnight, the announcement said. Riders can sign up using the kiosk at each bike station.

At three stations that are likely to be very busy, Capital Bikeshare staff members will stay at the station to remove bikes as soon as the racks fill up: 21st and I streets NW, 13th Street and New York Avenue NW and Columbus Circle by Union Station.

The bike sharing service also encouraged users to check the Spotcycle App before they go to a station, to see if any bikes are still left at that rack.

Virginia Transportation Secretary Aubrey Layne said officials have the ability to lift HOV restrictions if it will help traffic move more quickly, but they will wait to see what conditions are like on Wednesday before making any decisions. Layne said lifting the restrictions does not guarantee that traffic will flow more smoothly.

“I’m not sure if the decision to open right away would be any better,” he said.

Add another victim to the Metro shutdown: the Girl Scouts.

Or at least the group of girls who were supposed to stand outside Ballston station during the Wednesday night rush hour to hawk the alluring green boxes. During the 3:30 p.m. to 7:30 p.m. rush hours, a group can sell between 150 and 175 boxes, which at $4 each could be as much as $700. And that’s just at the one station. Troops have also set up tables at Courthouse, Virginia Square and Foggy Bottom.

“Some Girl Scouts are going to be very disappointed,” said Dee Dertke who stood at a table Tuesday night with her daughter Jessica, 13.

Metrobus, D.C. Circulator, suburban bus and train systems, ridesharing services — read the latest on all the non-Metro options here.

With the Metrorail system to shut down for 24 hours starting at midnight, the Washington region’s bus systems will have to step up service for the region’s scores of commuters Wednesday.

Metro general manager Paul J. Wiedefeld said Metrobus will continue to operate during the emergency closure of the entire rail system that starts at midnight tonight for safety checks of electric cables.

Meanwhile, transportation systems that feed to Metrorail in the greater Washington region were juggling Tuesday evening with the news and trying to determine whether adjustments to service would be necessary for Wednesday’s commute.

Read the full story.

Aaron Levin, 69, of Baltimore, said he normally rides MARC into the city before hopping on Metro to Rosslyn. But the system’s closure meant he would have to sit in traffic for the first time in 12 years commuting into the Washington area.

Levin, who works for Psychiatric News in Rosslyn, said he has no choice — he has a meeting to attend early Wednesday afternoon in Rosslyn.
“This was a wake-up call yesterday,” he said. “Failure-based maintenance isn’t such a good system. This is something they could have done in pieces every night for a year.”

For Billy Howell, 34, who lives near the Takoma Metro stop, Metro’s closure meant he would have to take an estimated $20 Uber ride to Reagan National Airport Wednesday morning for a flight to Austin, where he is presenting a film he worked on at South By Southwest. “You’re surprised at how frequently things of this severity happen,” he said.

Felts Jacobs, 29, said he learned of the Metro shutdown through Instagram. “I couldn’t believe it so I Googled it,” he said.

He quickly arranged a ride with a coworker from Silver Spring to Vienna, where he works as an equity processor for a bank. “It doesn’t even give anybody time to plan,” he said.

Heather Bodenhamer, 24, said that the announcement of the Metro shutdown was not surprising given the transportation agency’s poor track record. Bodenhamer said that during the past five years, she’s experienced massive delays, smoke on the tracks and poor service all around.

She used to travel from Rockville to Clarendon for work. She had to leave her home two or three hours early in order to arrive to work on time due to daily Metro troubles. “There were so many times I was late to work,” she said. “It’s sad how unreliable it can be. You never know what’s going to happen.”

Heidi Schriefer said she considers herself one of the lucky ones. She has several options for commuting to work and won’t be terribly thrown off by the shutdown. Instead, she will just take the bus from her home in Old Town Alexandria to her office in downtown Washington.

“A lot of other people won’t be able to make it in,” she said. “It’s just irritating that they announced it last-minute, on a week day, and it will affect the whole system.”

That, she said, is the Metro triplefecta.

Henrik Sundqvist was unlocking his bike at the East Falls Church Metro stop.

He and his wife work at totally opposite ends of the Washington Region. His office is located in Dunn Loring. She works in the District in Anacostia. Now that the metro will be closed Wednesday he is not sure how they will commute.

“It’s going to affect our work day for sure,” he said.

Sundqvist, who works as a communications director for a nonprofit, said that not only will the shutdown inconvenience riders, but the last-minute announcement seemed to be another instance of WMATA failing its customers.

“That’s part of being a transparent organization,” he said. “They messed up the messaging.”

Geoffrey Riungu, a graduate student from Clemson University, stood at the same stop on Tuesday afternoon. He took days off his spring break to visit Washington. A researcher in conservation, he had planned meetings with top officials with the National Park Service and even members of Congress. But now that the metro will be closed, he said he feels like he will be failing his department.

Riungu said National Park Service representatives have already canceled his meetings planned for Wednesday. With Metro service shut down, he won’t be able to meet on Capitol Hill with legislators. “It’s a big inconvenience for me,” he said. “I came here on a mission. I’m on a tight timeframe. Now I will have one day with nothing to account for.”

Sarah Boutaugh, 27, riding home Tuesday evening on the Red Line toward Shady Grove, said she is okay with a forced day of teleworking.

“If we’re in danger, better to shut it down for a day,” she said. A health care consultant, she usually commutes from Grovesnor to Dupont Circle. Wednesday she’ll work from home in North Bethesda.

Boutaugh said the announcement was “startling,” but she took a measured view of the safety issues plaguing the rail system. “I’m worried, but I feel like if I was really worried, I wouldn’t be on this train now,” she said

Diane Simeon will need to find a computer in order to work from home, because she doesn’t have one. (Nick Anderson/The Washington Post)

Diane Simeon, 24,  of Kensington, agreed. “If they’re going to actually fix things, I am okay with it,” she said of the shutdown. She said the annoyance of the situation is preferable to a crash or a fire. She had another request for Metro as she stood in a too-warm car: “Turn on the AC. It’s burning  right now.”

Simeon, an accountant, said her boss will let her work from home tomorrow. But she has to track down a computer because she doesn’t have one at home.

Matt Brown, 34, a visitor on business from Los Angeles, said he was heading to his mother-in-law’s house in Gaithersburg. From there, he plans to drive into downtown early tomorrow, probably leaving at 5 a.m., to get to a conference. “Certainly is a big mess,” he said.

Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe (D-Va.) sent a statement:

While I am disappointed that the closure of the Metro system has become necessary, I support the new management’s decision to take whatever steps are necessary to keep Virginians safe. Metro is essential to the economic health and quality of the Northern Virginia region and our entire Commonwealth – it’s time to make it the safe, accessible and dependable asset Virginia families deserve.

“Paul is doing exactly what he should be doing – putting safety and the lives of his passengers first,” said Ray LaHood, former U.S. Secretary of Transportation. “When you discover a potential threat to safety, you must do everything in your power to act. While the shutdown is obviously disruptive to the daily commutes of many Washingtonians, it is far better to be inconvenienced than to risk another life-threatening incident.”

An advocacy group seized on the shutdown as an opportunity to promote transportation spending. Ronit Dancis, president of the Action Committee For Transit, sent an email that said, “Elected officials take note: This is what happens when you don’t fund maintenance of public infrastructure.”

Metro Center station on Tuesday evening (Moriah Balingit/The Washington Post)

Janice Williams, a house cleaner from Hyattsville, will have to take three buses to get to work Wednesday. She was frustrated, but glad officials erred on the side of safety. “It sucks that it has to happen, but you don’t want to worry about people getting hurt,” Williams said, sitting on a concrete bench in Metro Center. “There could be worse things.”

The National Transportation Safety Board sent a statement:

The Washington Metropolitan Transit Authority informed the NTSB of Monday’s electrical arcing incident in a train tunnel near McPherson Square.  In response, an NTSB investigator observed the equipment involved in the event.  It appears that Monday’s electrical arcing event is of a similar type as the one involved in the January 2015 L’Enfant Plaza accident.

The NTSB is gathering information about this latest incident in support of our ongoing investigation of the L’Enfant Plaza accident, which is expected to be completed in early May.

D.C.’s public schools will remain open Wednesday. At least two charter schools, however, have decided to close, according to Tomeika Bowden, a spokeswoman for the D.C. Charter School Board.

Washington Latin Public Charter School, which is a few blocks from the Fort Totten Metro station, and William E. Doar Jr. Public Charter School for the Performing Arts, which is near the Rhode Island Avenue Metro station, will both be closed Wednesday.

All tardies and absences at D.C. public schools will automatically count as excused, according the school system’s spokeswoman, Michelle Lerner.

Read more on D.C. schools’ response to the situation here.

At Federal Triangle station, federal workers toted briefcases stuffed with documents and laptop bags in anticipation of working from home.

“All of us are taking home our computers to prepare,” said Gary Worthman, 58, pointing down to his.

Some, like Lori Mennitt, 52, of Falls Church, were upset by the closure, especially after going through a nightmarish commute Monday. Mennitt said she sat on an Orange Line train from West Falls Church for an hour and a half Monday to get to Federal Triangle, and the commute home was only 30 minutes shorter.

“Are things that bad that they can’t do it on a Saturday?” she asked. “There are going to be a lot of angry people.”

Perhaps because of his walkable commute, from Eastern Market to Federal Triangle, Christopher Herman, 69, said Metro made the right call. “I’m glad they’re erring on the side of caution,” he said. “We made a major investment in this system, and you’ve got to protect the investment.”

Most area universities are on spring break, minimizing the impact of the Metro closure on staff and students.

The University of Maryland, George Washington University and Gallaudet University are all on spring break.

Most of Howard University is on break, but about 500 medical and other health sciences students are not. A Howard spokesman said their academic schedules are expected to proceed as normal.

At the public University of the District of Columbia, whose students and staff rely heavily on Metro, students are also on break, but employees are expected to report to work as usual, spokesman John Gordon said. He said supervisors have been instructed to be lenient to those who are tardy.

The Office of Personnel Management announced that the federal government will be open Wednesday, with workers having the options of unscheduled leave or telework.

Jim Dinegar, president of the Greater Washington Board of Trade, said he sent an email at 5:30 p.m. urging his 10,000 business members to “do whatever it takes” to accommodate employees.

That might mean bosses let employees work from home, or employers pay for Uber or parking. “Let’s all pull together and get through a one-day crisis and hope it’s just one day,” Dinegar said.

He described the shutdown as a “bold move.”

“The priority is getting through tomorrow morning’s and tomorrow evening’s commute,” Dinegar said. “This is like a snow day times five, but this isn’t a delay in Metrorail. This is no Metrorail. This is going to be a horrible commute.”

Dinegar said some businesses, such as hotels, likely will need to have critical employees stay overnight Tuesday so they can be at work Wednesday morning. Hardest hit Wednesday, Dinegar said, will be restaurants, coffee shops and others that rely on the downtown lunch crowd.

Dinegar said he’s also concerned that the shutdown will have a chilling effect on tourism, both in the short and long term, if potential tourists are made to worry about the Metro system’s safety or reliability.

Overall, Dinegar said, he’s concerned that the shutdown will shake public confidence in Metro and encourage people to find other ways to commute. He said he’s also worried about what Metro will find in the inspections. “They won’t find good things. They’ll find risks,” Dinegar said. “I think this will pile on to what people are already worried about with Metro.”

Dinegar added: “It’s the right step to take, but it’s ridiculously unfortunate that the system is in such a state of disrepair that this step has to be taken.”

Maryland and Virginia lawmakers expressed deep concern over the news that the Metro system in the nation’s capital would be entirely shut down starting at midnight for at least 24 hours for safety checks.

U.S. Rep. Gerry Connolly (D-Va.) called the late Tuesday news — which he learned about from a note passed to him on the House floor — a “gut punch.”

U.S. Rep. Barbara Comstock (R-Va.) said Tuesday that the scheduled shutdown is just the latest manifestation of a systemic problem at Metro that has spanned decades.

“There needs to be a total cultural change there,” she said.

Read more lawmakers’ reactions here.

When Metro shuts down for 24 hours, workers will be stranded in traffic. Businesses — and customers — will suffer. A lot of money will be lost in gridlock.

It’s hard to understate what a big shock to the region this will be. But WMATA has actually already envisioned such a scenario.

Four years ago, the agency modeled what would happen to the region if Metro didn’t exist, as part of an exercise in illustrating to the public the “business case” for why transportation investments are so crucial. As WMATA explained when it introduced the study, “One of the best ways to understand the value of something is to take it away.”

What did the study find? Emily Badger explains it all here.