How WMATA is juggling riders’ needs and coronavirus safety

Having read announcements from WMATA communications about drastic cuts to bus service, including to the line running outside her home, Julie Patton Lawson advised a senior neighbor waiting at the bus stop last week that it wouldn’t run that day.

He set off on foot to a grocery store a mile away in the rain, only for Patton Lawson to later see the bus roll by, and find conflicting advice on WMATA’s website and twitter account. “I feel really bad now that he may have missed a bus,” says Patton Lawson, later spotting the man returning home with heavy bags.

The coronavirus is spreading exponentially throughout the world and the region is no exception. With COVID-19 cases increasing daily in the District and other cities in the region, the risk of transmission becomes greater. But accessible public transit for essential workers, and for those who need to make vital trips is also great.

Some are questioning WMATA’s approach to curtailing service during a time when many people need it most, bringing to the forefront some key questions.

How does the agency make sure its operators are safe, while also serving the people who still rely on transit? How do they communicate changes that inform people, without adding confusion? What trips need to happen during the pandemic and associated stay at home directives, and what can WMATA do to ensure those trips happen safely?

Evan Yeats, ANC4501 Commissioner, is particularly concerned about the equity implications of significant cuts to service, especially buses.

“Metrobus is a lifeline for many communities,” Yeats said via email. “Politicians and community leaders are tripping over themselves to congratulate our essential workers in this pandemic - janitors, hospital workers, and grocery workers among them - but what are the resources for them to get to work when Metro takes their transit away from them?”

Aren’t people supposed to be staying home?

Beyond health workers, cities and residents have essential needs such as food and basic public services, which require people to physically transfer from their homes to other places to avoid potentially disastrous societal consequences. Many of those people require transit to do so. But with a highly consequential virus most transmissible in settings used by lots of people, authorities have an essential responsibility to protect workers.

Cities have been grappling with these issues on the macro level while people wonder, sometimes in desperate circumstances, where their buses are.

For WMATA that means massive service reductions as well as protective measures including suspending fare payment on buses, while others like Houston maintain similar levels of service to prevent overcrowding.

But aren’t people supposed to be staying home? The share of trips that still need to happen might be larger than we think. A recent Transit Center report found that approximately 36% of transit riders nationally are classified as “essential workers”, which denotes people whose labor play a critical role in supporting healthcare, pharmaceutical services, grocery stores, water, sanitation and electricity services, among other areas.

This crisis has also highlighted the extent of people’s vulnerabilities more broadly than those of workers. An example of this are the people who have to bus to grocery stores, because of lack of access to one in their community.

Furthermore, children can only access the free meal service if they accompany their parents to the meal sites. WMATA does employ methods of mapping access to health services, grocery stores and pharmacies to reduce these impacts. But some people are still left in extremely difficult situations when it comes to access to food by transit cuts, especially bus cuts.

When agencies limit service or communicate inconsistently about service changes, it unquestionably reduces cities’ abilities to respond to a crisis. That’s one area that could result in better protection for both workers and riders.

How can transit services protect operators?

Transit authorities have to make choices about how to manage the balance between safety and supporting broader societal needs, and those choices have to be made and communicated on a just basis.

Agencies have several potential tools at their disposal to help keep transit personnel and riders safe through a broad variety of means.

WMATA and others are trying out rear door boarding or eliminating fare collection; covering every other bus seat; allowing bus operators to skip stops if the bus approaches some criteria of crowding; protective equipment; and finally, and least conducive to access to essential jobs and services, they can service or close stations.

Ross Catrow, Executive Director of RVA Rapid Transit, reports that Richmond is prioritizing operator protections as well as crowding reduction.

“Our transit agency, GRTC, has done a good job implementing most of the recommendations I’ve seen from other agencies across the country,” Catrow said. “They’ve gone fare-free, rear-door boarding, are [considering] keeping buses to fewer than 10 folks, and haven’t reduced service yet.”

Catrow adds that RVA is also employing innovative approaches to protect and support operators, such as contracting a local distillery to make bulk hand sanitizer and purchasing port-a-potties at the end of lines to provide operators (who used to depend on restaurants, now closed) an opportunity to use the bathroom.

While some transit agencies have explicitly touted the public health value of maintaining service levels in order to avoid overcrowding, WMATA is drastically limiting bus lines (and seemingly switching the schedules on others every few days), closing 17 Metro stations last week, and now closing off the first and last cars on every train.

Cleaning, disinfection and provision of protective equipment for staff has proven a considerable operational challenge and entails large-scale purchases. WMATA GM Paul Wiedefeld recently wrote to Congress to request emergency support, citing both an estimated revenue loss of $52 million per month due to reduced ridership and approximately $17 million in total on cleaning supplies and equipment. How sustainable is it to keep up the level of disinfection necessary to operate Metro safely?

Supply chain issues could echo the “Purell principle” we see on the individual level, as sudden demand for cleaning supplies skyrockets among transit and other authorities across the country.

Where’s my bus?

With WMATA struggling to strike an effective and sustainable balance between its essential health-supporting services and the safety of its personnel and riders, communication has been an early casualty.

“I watched with dismay as the Takoma bus hub essentially vanished on zero notice [two weekends ago] and bus benches were still occupied by patrons waiting for rides that never came with no signs or announcements,” Evans said.

Frequent service changes mean that only those on social media or who check the website daily can know with certainty how and whether their lines will operate on a given day. While concerned citizens pick up the communications slack by designing helpful maps about services still available or advising neighbors their buses aren’t running, that information can change quickly.

#DMV! Wednesday was another good day for #responsibility + #socialdistancing + common good + shared sacrifice:

RAIL: ⬇84%. ONLY 110K Y/Y. 👏👏👏BRAVO!
BUS: ⬇63%. 👎Work to do. ESSENTIAL trips only, please.

Let's keep limited Metro space avail for those who need it.#wmata

— Metro (@wmata) March 19, 2020

The communication has sometimes veered into shaming territory for bus riders, a particularly dicey frame given that bus riders are more likely to be low-income and people of color.

Reflecting on the infamous “thumbs down” tweet from WMATA about bus riders not being as “good” at reducing trips as Metro riders, Yeats said: “No one is shaming someone for driving to the grocery store to feed their family, you shouldn’t shame the people who need to take the bus.”

Can we do better?

For essential workers and anyone depending on transit for food access alike, transit is a lifeline that isn’t easily substituted in a time of crisis.

The nexus between where WMATA can serve these needs and protect transit workers is shrinking in the Washington region. If other cities and WMATA are able to protect operator health using means other than reducing service, it is plausible that service could be restored sooner. But what will have happened to essential riders whose services were cut in the meantime?

Correction: The article previously stated that GRTC was implementing 10 folks or less on buses. They are currently considering the measure.