Metro began operating a new bus service Monday morning that will run between Silver Spring and the District of Columbia.
The MetroExtra bus, which travels along Georgia Avenue and Seventh Street Northwest, will run every 10 minutes from 6 to 9:30 a.m. and 3 to 6:30 p.m. on weekdays.
The service, designated as Route 79, will make fewer stops than the traditional Metrobuses and expects to reduce travel time by 15 percent along the route. Instead of the 54 stops that Metro’s Georgia Avenue-Seventh Street bus line makes, the MetroExtra bus will make just 15.
“We hope it saves our customers precious minutes and gives them extra time to get where they need to go,” Metro General Manager John Catoe said.
Passengers will pay the same fare ($1.25) to ride the new bus route as they do for the traditional service, and the same transfer discounts will be available. Metro designed the new service to ease congestion on Metrobus Routes 70 and 71, which serve 18,000 riders every weekday and are Metro’s busiest routes. The natural-gas buses purchased to serve the route will be painted blue with a red and white Metro logo. Metrobuses serving the traditional routes have a white body with red and blue trim.
For a list of stops and a map of the new route, visit www.wmata.com.
