The X2

This Sunday, June 24th will bring significant service changes for Metrobus and Circulator. Close to home here in Carver, the X2 and X9 buses are making midday adjustments, and for the better. From WMATA: X2 Benning Road-H Street : All weekday midday trips will operate between Minnesota Avenue Metrorail Station and Lafayette Square. To improve reliability, the time between weekday midday buses will increase from 10 minutes to 12 minutes. X9 Benning Road-H Street Limited : New weekday midday limited-stop Route X9 MetroExtra service will operate every 15 minutes between the Metro Center and Minnesota Avenue Metrorail stations. What it means: Since the X9 previously ran as a rush hour only bus, we're getting more trips downtown during the midday and lunchtime hours. This is awesome. The X9 does make several clustered stops from 19th St NE to 14th St NE, but as a limited stop bus, I generally find it much, much faster than the X2 for trips between Carver Langsto...

Just a few months ago I applauded Metro's decision to extend service hours of the X2 bus to 24/7 by adding overnight service. We may be in line for weekday midday service upgrades as well. Under a new proposal for the X2 route, WMATA would: reduce weekday midday bus frequency from every 8 minutes to every 10-12 minutes send all downtown bound buses all the way to Lafayette Park (eliminating Gallery Place as a terminal) OK, so how is reducing service on the X2 helpful? Well, that reduction would make room for the new X9 midday service. The X9 bus currently operates limited stop service between Capital Heights and Metro Center. It operates during rush hours only. The new proposal would add X9 midday service at 20 minute intervals. Buses would still run existing intervals during morning and evening rush.  If approved, all adjustments would take place in June 2018. Other proposed DC Metrobus changes include: extending the 50s buses to the new Wharf development in SW...