The District’s new program to add Metro passes to student identification cards has become bogged down with problems, including technical glitches in Metro’s beleaguered fare system. Two weeks into the new school year, city officials acknowledged that the rollout of the D.C. One Card has been facing problems that have caused delays to handing out the transit passes. The subsidized passes serve as a transportation lifeline for some 15,000 D.C. public school students, helping them use the Metro system to get to class in lieu of yellow school buses while also giving them access to the whole region. The delays have prompted complaints from parents and school officials.
So city officials spent the Labor Day weekend processing a backlog of 2,500 cards, said District Department of Transportation spokesman John Lisle. They then hand-delivered them around the city on Tuesday, he said.
Still, those who do have the cards will have to visit a Metro sales office each month to renew their cards for at least a few months, instead of uploading new passes at Metrorail fare vending machines.
The problem was two-fold. The city had the backlog in processing applications because of a staffing shortage, Lisle said. He said the emergency work over the weekend resolved the delay.
But Metro also has a problem with the software in the fare vending machines that let students renew the passes in Metro stations. The agency needs to rework the text that shows up on the machines when students load the new passes, said Metro spokesman Dan Stessel. He said Metro crews hope to have it resolved by November or December. In the meantime, students will have to go to Metro’s sales offices in person each month to renew their passes until the glitch is fixed.
It’s just the latest problem with Metro’s fare system. The agency has had to delay planned fare increases multiple times and even open its faregates to riders because of software and hardware problems.
“It is now a 12-year-old system,” Stessel said. “It does have limitations, and uploading new features does present problems.”
The city was planning on shifting all its student transit passes to the new D.C. One Card in phases starting this fall so that students could flash their student ID to board Metro buses and trains to get to class. In May, students at the School Without Walls tested the cards as part of a pilot program.
The passes have been seen as a way to help cut down on crime. Cards have the student’s names and schools listed on them so they can be canceled if lost or stolen.
