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Transit Tangents
The Podcast where we discuss all things transit. Join us as we dive into transit systems across the US, bring you interviews with experts and advocates, and engage in some fun and exciting challenges along the way.
Transit Tangents
Washington, D.C. - Transit Tour
Join us as we explore Washington, D.C., using only public transit. This episode introduces listeners to the city's diverse transportation options. From the automated Red Line to quirky streetcars and bike shares, the hosts share experiences while highlighting which modes are effective and what makes the DC transit landscape unique.
• Navigating through DC's transit system using metro, buses, and streetcars
• Insights from a local expert commuter on the DC transit experience
• Automation of the Red Line and its impact on the service
• Challenges and nuances of riding the streetcar through mixed traffic
• Discussion on the popularity and alternatives within Capitol Bike Share
• Exploring the Navy Yard's redevelopment and its public transport connections
• Sightseeing highlights along the National Mall
• Comparison to other cities' transit systems and their effectiveness
• Reflection on community engagement driven by transportation initiatives
Doors are closing.
Speaker 2:Public transit that's my way to roll On the metro. I'm taking control. Bus stops, train tracks it's my daily grind, daily grind. Public transit, it's the rhythm of my life.
Speaker 1:This week on Transit Tangents. We do DC in a day using only public transit, from the DC metro to buses, street cars and more. We cover the nation's capital and put their transit system to the test. All of this and more coming up on Transit Tangents. All right, we are here in a very chilly Washington DC, here doing DC in a day using only public transit. We'll be taking buses, trains, all sorts of things throughout the day.
Speaker 1:Streetcar Streetcar yep Long escalators, long escalators coming soon. Yesterday we got in at DCA, took the yellow line, transferred downtown to the green line to go stay with some friends who live in the area, and we're joined by a friend right now who is in the top 3% of Metro riders for the year 2023 here in DC. Yes, that's my claim to fame.
Speaker 1:Yes so this is Kevin. Kevin's going to be with us today and kind of giving us some more information on things, because Chris and I don't live here. I haven't been here since I was here on my 8th grade field trip and I think I was here again for a day or two as a 14 or 15-year-old.
Speaker 3:Yeah, my first trip here I was 17, but I've been here several times. I've gotten a chance to explore the metro a good bit and we have great friends here. Best metro in the country. Best and prettiest metro in the country.
Speaker 1:All right, so from here we're hop on the train and hopefully it's warmer down there and head to Union Station. That was fast.
Speaker 3:Yeah, it was fast. So we started in Dupont Circle. We took the red line over here to Union Station, which is sort of a transit hub in DC. Here you can catch Amtrak, you can catch the MARC trains which head out to sort of the Maryland area. You can take trains out to Virginia. You can also take the streetcar or the Metro bus.
Speaker 1:One notable thing about the red line is that it is now automated. There are drivers actually inside of the cars, but the cars are speeding up, slowing down, stopping, all on their own. They used to be automated. In DC a while ago there was an accident that was unrelated to the automation, it was a track issue. They stopped it because everyone's afraid of that sort of thing. But the Red Line is now automated again as of about two or three weeks ago and we're so that's kind of ended December of 2024.
Speaker 1:So pretty exciting, and it's allowed for kind of smoother trips on the Red Line as well as speeding things up. There are sections of the track where, with the automation, the trains are able to go faster now than they were before with human drivers. So pretty interesting and hopefully we see something more of on metros in the US and elsewhere. All right, from Union Station we're going to hop on a streetcar here that we talked about yesterday a little bit with some friends. It is a little bit of a funny little system. I think We'll see how it actually is in practice, but we're going to take the streetcar and from there we'll eventually head down to the Naval Yard area.
Speaker 3:I think the streetcar might have been an afterthought to Union Station.
Speaker 1:We've been going through a bit of a maze here. Why, okay, oh, we could have come right here. That's hilarious, okay. The signage is terrible for this In all fairness, I don't think this street car is well ridden. They definitely don't do so well in the snow. Kind of bikes and scooters everywhere.
Speaker 3:Lovely day for scootering. Rip to that scooter?
Speaker 1:yeah, rough, alright, we've finally identified the streetcar stop in the middle of the road here. This episode is brought to you by us. That's right. We don't have a sponsor or anything. So if you want to help the show out directly, the best way to do so is to check out our brand new merch store or support us directly on Patreon to help us get to more cities like this.
Speaker 3:So we did something that most people in DC haven't done, which is ride the DC streetcar.
Speaker 2:I've lived here for four years and I've never taken it.
Speaker 1:Little hard to find from Union Station also. Yeah, it was, I don't know. It's fine and all but like streetcars that just kind of run in mixed traffic, run into all sorts of issues, where it's just like it's a bus, but slightly bigger. But in many cases and on this street like I've seen way more buses go by there's way more people riding the buses.
Speaker 3:Yeah, so the challenge with this one? It opened in 2016,. There was a plan to make a lot more street cars, but that plan has been canceled, so this is kind of what DC has now, and it runs down. We're on H Street, h Street. So we're on H Street, which is really popular, Like there's businesses or stuff to do out here. You can find Kevin here every weekend.
Speaker 1:One weekend a year. You can find him here.
Speaker 3:But the streetcar runs along the edges of the road all the way down the length of the road, which presents its own challenges. We just watched it get stuck behind a delivery vehicle for quite a while. Yeah, so all in all, it's maybe a novelty and good for what it is. On H Street it is free.
Speaker 2:It is free Cannot be said about the rest of our transit.
Speaker 3:That's fair, and where this?
Speaker 1:is serving. It's actually not fair. There's no fair.
Speaker 3:Sorry for that. The area this is servicing, though, it's already serviced by buses. So yeah, it is a free option, it's just a little slower you never know.
Speaker 1:I'm curious to see how it compares. We're planning to get to Kansas City at some point. Kansas City has been working on extending their streetcar. Their supposedly has some kind of transit priority dedicated lanes.
Speaker 1:This did not feel like it had transit priority Definitely at all. There's not a few people using it. There's actually an extension to the streetcar in the works which will connect Union Station to the Benning Road metro station. I'll be curious to watch and see if this actually happens and, if it does, what impact it might have on the streetcar ridership. From here we're gonna walk around the neighborhood a little bit and then eventually we're going to hop on a bus towards the Naval Yard. But let's check out this 8th Street and kind of close by the Capitol Hill area. While walking through the neighborhood we stumbled across a bike share docking station.
Speaker 2:Capitol Bike Share. We call it Cabby. It's great. You can get like a. I think you pay like $50-something for like a year-long membership in unlimited use. They have electric bikes too. It's 95 for the year.
Speaker 2:Um, it's really solid for getting around some of the neighborhoods that don't have like metro access especially. Um, in general, though, like a lot of people like have bikes in the city, there's really great bike lanes, protected bike lanes and a lot of the major like roadways, um, and also there's just wonderful biking trails along the city. So you have have like Mount Vernon, across the river that goes through Virginia. You have the C&O Canal that goes all the way up to like Harper's Ferry Cool. We have the Anacostia River Trail that goes along the other river and then the famous Rock Creek, which is beautiful lovely to have that like in the city and you can take it like all the way out into Maryland through a lot of really great green spaces. But biking it's a big biking city. Once a month we have DC Bike Party, just like a huge party on wheels that just rolls around the city with music and costume and lights. Do people take the bike share? Yes, lots of people use bike share for it. That's awesome.
Speaker 1:Cool, we would give it a shot, but a little chilly and a little deadly because many of the bike lanes are covered.
Speaker 3:nice, right now, not today.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, yeah, All right, we are kind of on the edge of the Capitol Hill neighborhood and we're about to catch the 90 bus to head towards the Navy Yards area.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and Navy Yards area is an area that's been sort of redeveloped in DC. You've been in this area a lot. We have friends there.
Speaker 2:Yeah, there's been a lot of development. It's where the baseball stadium is, and so it gets a lot of traffic for large events. They're converting one of the old bridges into a park, which is really interesting, trying to connect the Anacostia side to the Navy Yard side. Yeah, there's a lot of construction that's been going on down there.
Speaker 1:It'll be interesting to see some of the new construction versus like. We're kind of walking through a lot of these cute neighborhoods with nice, like kind of row homes and like dense, but kind of like, you know, not like high-rise buildings.
Speaker 3:Right, yeah, a lot of density, just low-rise density, and you can see around around us.
Speaker 2:Beautiful neighborhoods, much more modern apartment buildings everywhere, cool, awesome.
Speaker 1:Well, we'll catch the bus here in a couple minutes. If you haven't liked this video or left a comment, please consider doing so. It helps us out quite a bit. All right, we just got off the 92 bus. Chris and Kevin realized that they had some friends with little kittens who lived right next to the bus stop. So quick pit stop to go check out some baby kittens. That were very cute. Right now, though, we're walking towards some of the development in the in the Navy Yard area.
Speaker 3:We were walking through the Washington Navy Yards area and I happened to look over and realize we're also on the DC Transportation Trail, which provides history of transportation throughout the US. Yeah, so fun little, fun little accident in.
Speaker 1:DC and we're close to the Department of Transportation. So we're thinking maybe it's related, probably related. Yeah, so fun little, fun little accident in DC and we're close to the Department of Transportation. So we're thinking maybe it's related, probably related yes, yeah, thank you, pete. Yes.
Speaker 3:So we have been walking around the Navy Yards which have been sort of redeveloped. It's very different than the rest of DC. Typically in DC you're going to see like the two, three, four story townhomes here. You're looking around and it is all mid-level Ten story or so. Mid-rise buildings, a lot of offices. Kevin, you're very familiar with this neighborhood as well.
Speaker 2:Yes, my office is down here. If my boss is watching this. I am checking my team's messages, don't worry. It's a Saturday what are you talking about?
Speaker 3:Yeah, exactly, but yeah, so we are exploring this neighborhood. We just walked by the Department of Transportation. Unfortunately, we did not meet up with Mayor Pete.
Speaker 1:Yeah, he blew us off. No. I tried to get an appointment, but no, no answer Left us out in the cold.
Speaker 3:Yes, all right. We walked down Navy Yards. We got some much-needed lunch and warmth. Now we are over at the Nationals Stadium, home of the 2019 World Champions. Wow, you're a real sports guy, aren't you? I'm such a sports guy, yeah, at the top of your head.
Speaker 1:Yeah, this stadium is really close to a Metro stop, which is really convenient and kind of the street this is on, I'm sure, is very crowded for Nationals games. So from here we're going to hop back on the Metro. Which stop are we getting on at?
Speaker 2:Smithsonian. We're going to transfer from the yellow and green to the orange and blue. Take another couple stops in Smithsonian Gotcha.
Speaker 3:Go check out the National Mall.
Speaker 1:While we're waiting for the train real quick.
Speaker 3:We'll fill you in on exactly how you pay. Yeah, this is something we talk about every city we go to. If it's an app, if it's transit app, if it's whatever, oh, here comes our train. Uh, in this case, you can get the smart trip on your wallet, on your phone, or get the old-fashioned round school get a card very simple you just walk up and tap your phone or tap your card yeah, nice and easy.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you can. Also, they usually have kiosks at all the train stations too, if you wanted to buy a ticket without using your phone.
Speaker 2:DC Metro is unique in some cities in that it calculates the distance you travel and fares adjust accordingly. So it's not a few days based on where you enter and where you exit.
Speaker 1:You tap when you get in, tap when you get out, if you're interested in learning more about DC area transit. We also did an episode on the Purple Line coming to Maryland. While this is very nice, chris, I think this would have been better if it was about 30 degrees warmer. Something we haven't said yet is that at this same very time we're here right now, the other option was to be in Phoenix. Phoenix is presently about. I don't actually know, but I'm just going to go out on a limb and say it's probably 80 degrees and sunny, it's 80 degrees right here in my heart. Lewis, we wouldn't have Kevin if we were in uh, exactly, if we were in Phoenix either, but find someone else.
Speaker 3:So this is something we talked about on previous episodes, when we talked about the highway expansion in the US and we talked about the transcontinental motor convoys, and we just came across the little monument that shows where the first and second of the transcontinental motorways or motor convoys took off from right in front of the white house we just walked by the white house, saw some of the monuments in the mall.
Speaker 1:um, still very chilly, but we're uh now making our way. We're gonna head over to georgetown, so we're currently at Farragut West area, okay, and we're going to take the 33.
Speaker 3:33 over to Georgetown, which famously doesn't have a Metro going through it, so the only way to access it is walking, biking or taking the bus.
Speaker 1:There also was a circulator system that went through Georgetown. It literally ended about two weeks ago. Yes, um, the dc circulator was a bus system separate from wmata, run by the city of washington dc. It was designed to connect key attractions and neighborhoods with frequent free service. Due to declining ridership and budget constraints, the service fully was discontinued at the end of 2024, all day. We've had fairly good luck with trains and buses kind of coming on time in general, like DC, as far as other cities we've done this in, is much more actually set up to be able to use only public transit on a day-to-day basis. But we did potentially just encounter our first ghost bus. Next one, it Friendship Heights.
Speaker 3:We're taking our friendship to new heights, wow 33, destination Friendship Heights Station.
Speaker 2:The base fare is $2.25 for this bus. It's kind of nice here.
Speaker 1:We made it to the Georgetown waterfront. We walked through Georgetown, which was very cute, very nice main street, downtown area.
Speaker 3:It's basically a mall.
Speaker 2:It's a very nice mall, but it's a mall. It's an open-air mall.
Speaker 1:I said, it also gives very similar vibes to Newberry Street in Boston if you're from that area. The Domain in Austin.
Speaker 2:This is much nicer than the Domain in Austin. I'm kidding, don't give the Domain credit like that.
Speaker 1:But definitely a lot of nice-looking spaces. Yeah, obviously. Also in Georgetown you have Georgetown University, which is further up the road that we did not go to.
Speaker 3:Struggling in the cold a little bit here, yeah, but yeah I think we're gonna find a coffee shop and then make our way back towards Train town, the train part of DC that's gonna veer off into.
Speaker 1:So also, as we're sitting here sliding around, also behind us is Virginia, roslyn, roslyn, virginia. The DC Metro connects quite a ways into Virginia, goes all the way up to Dulles.
Speaker 2:Now Silver Line completion.
Speaker 1:Which we were kind of hoping that we would fly into Dulles so that we could ride the much longer journey from Dulles. Instead we flew into DCA, which is very seamless transfer, as you probably saw in the beginning of this, to get downtown.
Speaker 3:But I do think, heading out towards Dulles, we'll definitely want to feature that in the future because what they've done on the whole Silver Line is at each of the stops there's now a lot of transit oriented development. So in McLean and all the way out towards Weehee, reston, reston thank you, yeah, mclean and then all the way out to Reston and then out to the airport, so a lot of really cool development there. So we'll definitely talk about that a little bit in the future.
Speaker 1:Go for it, did I lose?
Speaker 3:it 33.
Speaker 1:After finishing up some coffee, we headed back out to catch the bus.
Speaker 3:We saw it go by and had to do our first bit of running for the day.
Speaker 1:This almost was the first episode that we did not have to run to catch a bus. You're good.
Speaker 3:I'm gonna try really hard not to fall.
Speaker 2:No, no, no, no no.
Speaker 1:I almost just ate it.
Speaker 3:That was almost bad ate it, that was almost bad. Wow, I'm really glad you caught yourself.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that would have been rough, chase it at home.
Speaker 2:Nobody can get away from you, chase it.
Speaker 3:So we just got off of the 33 bus from Georgetown after grabbing a little coffee and we took the bus across town to the Chinatown area of DC. So now we're walking down to see the Chinatown gate and then we're going to go check out Capitol Crossing from there. All right, everybody, this is our last stop of the day here in dc where we are standing on uh capital crossing, which is, uh, on top of a highway.
Speaker 1:Here we actually talked about this highway, highway 395, 395 we talked about this in the episode talking about cap and stitch projects while we were at clad warren park in dallas. Um, this is one of the few cap and stitches that has pretty tall buildings on it, so you can kind of see these buildings behind us are literally on top of the few cabin stitches that has pretty tall buildings on it, so you can kind of see these buildings behind us are literally on top of the highway. It goes down quite a ways.
Speaker 3:You can see from the other side. There's also brand new buildings and a highway entrance right here.
Speaker 1:As well, and yeah, you would have no idea that there is a highway here. It was just kind of a trench open highway before and now instead you have a bunch of predominantly offices. There's some apartments as well further down, um, that kind of cover up the whole section.
Speaker 2:yeah, it's actually a very nice, uh vibrant, little part of the neighborhood, like nice buildings offices restaurants yeah, close enough to chinatown and the gallery place and a few other big name destinations in the city yeah, exactly, exactly.
Speaker 1:From Capitol Crossing it was time to start to make our way back to the train to head back to our friend's place. That was our full day here. We've done all sorts of stuff. We're currently at Woodley Park, which is close to where we're staying with our friends nearby here we did a whole bunch today.
Speaker 3:Yeah, we did a lot today. We saw the National Mall, we saw Capitol Crossing bunch today. Yeah, we did a lot today. We uh saw the national mall, we saw capital crossing. We went to georgetown, we saw the navy yard, we went to union station, we did the streetcar.
Speaker 1:we did a lot today um, overall, I mean, uh, obviously, bc of all the cities we've done this in so far, is like has the most legit transit by far.
Speaker 3:yeah, and typically we do these episodes as like you'd be surprised that the transit's good. I don't know San Antonio's pretty close. No, but we did this in a different way. It's not really showing you like, oh surprise, DC's good transit. It's showing you DC's good transit and this is a good tour of that transit Right.
Speaker 1:And it's to show that, like the United States, can do it when they put their minds to it.
Speaker 3:We really can. I mean, if you look at the station, the station's absolutely beautiful. All of the DC stations especially around the city kind of have a similar aesthetic.
Speaker 1:That is just this brutalist dream, slightly dystopian, yeah yeah, a couple of things that I think are interesting in comparing to some of the other cities. We were talking about how Houston actually had really good headways on both their light rail and on their buses. The light rail, the red line, was like every six minutes. A lot of the buses were every eight minutes, which is actually faster than any specific bus line here. When we're talking about buses, the difference being the fastest is about 12 minutes.
Speaker 3:I think 12, 12,.
Speaker 1:Yeah, about 12 minutes. The major difference where it almost feels like it's better here is oftentimes there are multiple routes that serve similar terrain. So while it might be every 12 minutes for a specific bus, there might be a different bus that kind of makes up for it. So that was an interesting takeaway, for sure. Absolutely.
Speaker 3:Any parting thoughts of what you think of your hometowns?
Speaker 2:Petra, yes, DC is like a dream for, I think, a lot of people to live in, because it's so walkable and so accessible. You have 15-minute cities all over the district and everyone that I know who lives here. They have such a wonderful community because of how easy it is to find friends, find neighbors, find places where you can meet people. And I think transit like really helps people in the city, like connect in a way that I don't, I haven't experienced in other places. It's awesome.
Speaker 1:I think a lot of the housing has something to do with it too. You've got like a lot of dense housing, a lot of people living close together, of been close together. Uh, I'm currently reading, uh, the life and death of great american cities by jane jacobs, which talks all about like, how much, how important like streets are, housing, all sort of stuff, and as I was walking around, I couldn't help but thinking about a lot of connections that are tied in, uh, with that book. But, um, anything else you want to add?
Speaker 1:I think that's it all right, uh, all that being said uh, if you have not rated this, if you're listening or liked and left a comment on the video sorry, that's getting really loud if you have not rated this, if you're listening or liked and left a comment on the video Sorry, that's getting really loud If you have not rated this on your favorite podcast platform or liked or left a comment on the video, please do so. We love hearing from folks. If you live here in DC and you think we missed something or we're totally wrong about something, definitely let us know. I'm sure someone will find something.
Speaker 3:Yes, if you want to see episodes ahead of time or bonus content, check out our Patreon page.
Speaker 1:Yep, that's the best way to directly support us, but otherwise, thank you all so much for watching. Looking forward to seeing you all in another city very soon. Yes, and with that, enjoy the rest of your.
Speaker 3:Transit Tangents Tuesday.
Speaker 2:I was supposed to say that too, we're going to leave in. We're absolutely leaving that part in.