WMATA is requesting public comments on its revised draft budget and Metrobus service plans for the coming fiscal year 2022. Comments can be submitted through 5 pm on Tuesday, March 16, 2021, by using the WMATA survey and comment form or calling toll-free 844-468-5748, or by providing testimony at one of WMATA’s virtual public hearings scheduled for March 8 – 10. See the WMATA web page for additional details.
If the federal government does not provide additional funds for transit services in the next few months, WMATA is anticipating it will have to make service cuts at the start of 2022. The latest proposal includes several potential service reductions for bus routes serving ANC3B.
– 30N/30S: Eliminate this cross-town service between Friendship Heights and Naylor Gardens/Southern Avenue SE; instead require people to transfer if they are traveling between upper Norhwest and points south of the National Mall
– 31 and 33: Maintain these two routes on Wisconsin Avenue, from Friendship Heights to Federal Triangle and Archives respectively; keep service at current frequency, extend service to 2 AM in first half of the year but go back to current midnight end time in second half of the year.
– D2: Maintain current service for the first half of FY2022, 7 days a week running about every 24 minutes for the first half of FY2022. In the second half of the year WMATA proposes to create a new combined D2/N6/M4 route that would follow the current D2 route between Dupont Circle and Benton Street but would then continue on Tunlaw and New Mexico to Nebraska Avenue and on to Sibley Hospital and MacArthur Boulevard. The bus would NOT operate on the interior blocks of Glover Park (39th St, 40th St, 41st St, Edmunds, Calvert, or Benton), where an estimated 25% of riders usually board. The new route would operate every 25 minutes at peak times, 35 minutes at other times.
– N6: Maintain current service 7 days a week for the first half of FY2022 year. In the second half of the year, operate asa combined route with the D2 and M4 between Dupont Circle and Sibley Hospital/MacArthur Boulevard. The only portion of the N6 route that would be served by the new route would be the Idaho/Cathedral/New Mexico/Nebraska/Massachusetts “loop,” not including any of the rest of Massachusetts Avenue, not Friendship Heights or Tenleytown (which was served by the N2), or Connecticut Avenue from Dupont Circle to Farragut North.