Commuters who rely on both Virginia Railway Express and Metro to get to their jobs each day are slated to be hit with a double whammy: fare hikes on both services starting July 1.
The Virginia commuter train service is set to raise fares 3 percent, after its operations board gave initial approval on Friday. Metro’s board is calling for increases that average 5 percent for rail riders but can reach as high as 27 percent.
Coupled with the Jan. 1 decrease in federal transit benefits from a maximum of $230 per month to $125, riders will be reaching even deeper to pay their way to their D.C. jobs, said Paul Milde, a Stafford County supervisor who voted against the VRE hike.
| Fares to rise |
| VRE: |
| Minimum one-way ticket: $2.90 -> $3 |
| Maximum one-way ticket: $10.30 -> $10.65 |
| Maximum Fredericksburg Line monthly pass: $285.50 -> $294.10 |
| Maximum Manassas Line monthly pass: $234.20 -> $241.20 |
| METRORAIL: |
| Minimum peak SmarTrip: $1.95->$2.10 |
| Minimum off-peak SmarTrip $1.60 -> $1.70 |
| Maximum peak SmarTrip: $5 ->$5.75 |
| Maximum off-peak SmarTrip: $2.75 -> $3.50 |
| Metrobus: |
| SmarTrip $1.50 ->$1.60 |
“We should be making it easier to ride mass transit, so we can try to keep traffic off the highways,” he said. “And also the reduction in the federal subsidy has made it harder to afford mass transit.”
An estimated 68 percent of VRE riders use some form of the benefits, which can be pre-tax deductions from paychecks or given outright by employers as a perk. Many riders take the VRE trains from as far as Fredericksburg and Manassas into L’Enfant Plaza or Union Station, then take Metrorail or bus to make the final leg to their jobs.
Add the Metro hike at the same time? “That’s just another reason for us to hold the line,” Milde said.
But not many of the some 9,500 riders who take VRE each day fought the hikes. Like Metro, VRE held public hearings to solicit riders’ opinions on the increase. It received 34 emails and 29 people attended hearings. No one attended two of the seven hearings, a first for the agency. Some 4,200 submitted testimony to Metro.
VRE last raised fares in 2009, when it socked riders with two rounds of increases six months apart. Metro last increased fares in 2010 with back-to-back hikes just months apart, too.
VRE did not return calls for comment but has said that it expects the hike to bring in $900,000 as state and other funding has decreased.
But Milde said the agency did not need to raise fares as soaring ridership — often leaving standing room only — has brought in more money. The agency recently bought a new locomotive with that money, rather than saving the money to avoid a fare increase, he said.
“It’s still a good deal but I don’t think that we should doing that each time we overspend,” he said.
It’s not just Metro and VRE that are getting more expensive, though. D.C. taxi rates rose on Saturday. And gas prices have soared to more than $4.10 per gallon.
