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I'm from Brooklyn, NY. There was an article in one of our local papers about a week ago, mentioning that the "price point" had been reached in Washington. That's the point where the price of gasoline forces people to start using mass transit. According to the article, gas in the DC area recently hit $4.00/gallon, and when it did, ridership on the Metro took a tremendous leap up.
Has this really happened? And if so, has the system put extra trains in service to meet the new needs?
I'm not sure the Metro system has all that many extra trains to spare. The system is very near its limit of operational trains, backup trains, and trains in repair yards, regardless of the price of gas.
Yeah, it's definitely happened, but Metro doesn't really have the ability to just increase the amount of trains running. Cars (esp. on the red line) are so packed it's like a scene from New Delhi or something.
I've responded by driving. Lot less traffic out there.
It's been more crowded. Normally, when I get on the yellow or green at L'Enfant in the morning the train's half-empty (since everyone gets off there), but lately I've been struggling just to find a place to hold on.
They've been posting up things about "record ridership" as well.
I'm sure that gas prices have something to do with it but I think metro ridership has been steadily increasing for some time. Maybe since the system opened.
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