Montgomery County budgets for bus improvements and continued free fares

Montgomery County’s Ride On bus system was hit hard by the COVID-19 pandemic, losing many of its riders and fare revenue. As a result the agency, which is the second largest suburban bus system in the United States and served 20 million passenger trips in 2019, scaled back bus service. It currently operates at 82% of pre-pandemic levels.

But Montgomery County’s next budget offers some hope of getting back to normal, and making future improvements. The fiscal year 2022 (FY22) budget — which runs from July 1, 2021 to June 30, 2022 — makes a number of commitments to providing bus service that is more frequent, reliable, and affordable.

Some of these commitments align with what we’ve been pushing for at the Montgomery Better Buses coalition, led by the Coalition for Smarter Growth: bus network redesign, extending free fares, and other improvements. There’s more to be done, but this is a major step in the right direction.

Bringing back service

Montgomery County’s FY22 budget provides funding to restore service to 97% of pre-pandemic levels around Labor Day and 100% by February 2022. Some routes will see more frequent service than they did prior to the pandemic, including the 55 route — Ride On’s highest ridership route, which runs from Rockville Station to Germantown.

Nearly all routes will return to minimum 30 minute headways as service returns. But more frequent service — typically defined as buses arriving every 10 minutes or less — is the most important factor in improving transit service for current riders and attracting new ones. In FY20, pre-pandemic, there were only four routes that achieved 10 minute or less headways. The county also now has the FLASH on Route 29, which comes every seven minutes weekdays during rush hour.

A return to the status quo is a step forward, but it isn’t enough to build a better transit system and make buses the mode of choice in Montgomery County — other budget items lay the groundwork to make service better than before the pandemic.

Bus prioritization including bus rapid transit

Montgomery County’s Department of Transportation (MCDOT)will continue efforts to pilot bus prioritization around the county, including in downtown Silver Spring, Veirs Mill Road near the Wheaton Metro Station, and around the Germantown Transit Center.

The budget also advances $12.1 million for transit improvements in the Great Seneca Science Corridor, the area that includes Shady Grove, Crown Farm, Rio, Kentlands, Adventist Shady Grove Hospital, and the Universities at Shady Grove. The host of improvements will bring new, upgraded transit stations; dedicated bus and bike lanes; transit signal priority; new roadway connections; upgrades to transit centers; and bike and pedestrian improvements.

These transit improvements will allow for the Great Seneca Science Corridor to meet its master plan’s staging requirements to allow 2.3 million square feet of commercial development and 2,000 new dwelling units to move forward. Construction is not permitted until the area receives upgraded transit.

The original plan was to build the Corridor Cities Transitway (CCT), a fifteen-mile bus rapid transit (BRT) line that would have connected communities along the I-270 corridor between Clarksburg and Shady Grove, including the Great Seneca Science Corridor. Governor Hogan cut funding for the CCT in 2019. The project currently in the works will serve a more limited area with four separate lines rather than one continual route built in two phases. The county still intends to pursue funding for the CCT, and views the Great Seneca Science Corridor transit improvements as complementary.

The budget also continues to move forward the design and engineering plans for BRT on MD-355 and Veirs Mill Road, and advances funding for the North Bethesda Transitway — although there is still no construction funding allocated for any future BRT projects.

Transit advocates in Montgomery County have campaigned for years for a gold-standard BRT network. Last August, the Route 29 FLASH, the first component of the planned BRT network, finally opened — but without fully dedicated lanes. MCDOT’s study of the corridor ended up recommending managed lanes where buses would share lanes with high-occupancy vehicles.

The County Council’s Transportation and Environment Committee rejected this approach and sent MCDOT back to the drawing board to figure out how to make dedicated lanes work on Route 29. The FY22 budget includes pilot bus lanes on Route 29 near Four Corners to determine whether bus-only lanes would be effective.

Free fares (at least for now)

Ride On will remain fare-free for all riders until September 30. After that, fares will remain free for seniors, youth ages 18 and under, and people with disabilities through June 30, 2022. The county is conducting a fare equity study to determine what, if anything, should be done with fares after September 30.

With this, Montgomery County joins a regional and national conversation about the future of free transit. Free fares don’t draw riders the way frequent, reliable bus service does, but fare holidays seek to bring some financial relief to the 47 percent of Ride On riders who have an annual household income of less than $30,000. Advocates in the Montgomery Better Buses coalition argue that the county can improve service while also ending fares.

While most other bus systems in the region have gone back to collecting fares, Ride On has stayed free. The system was planning to resume fare collection on April 5, but reversed course after a March 29 letter from the County Council, led by at-large Councilmember Evan Glass, asked MCDOT to keep Ride On free throughout the current State of Emergency “to ensure equitable access to the vaccine while also signaling our continued support for essential workers.” This came alongside a push from the Montgomery Better Buses coalition.

The Council’s Transportation and Environment Committee debated whether or not to include Metrobus’ Montgomery County service in the continued fare holiday. Metrobus fares are set by the WMATA Board, which includes representatives from Virginia, Maryland, DC, and the federal government. Reduced fares for a certain jurisdiction must be supported with increased funding from that jurisdiction to cover the lost revenue. For example, when Montgomery County passed the Kids Ride Free program, Montgomery County paid WMATA for the lost fare revenue.

Traditionally, the county has set Ride On’s bus fares aligned with the Metrobus fares set by the WMATA Board, as an equity measure. This year, the council ultimately decided that they preferred to work with Prince George’s County, WMATA, and the Maryland Department of Transportation to identify reduced fare or fare-free options for state-funded Metrobus routes in Maryland, rather than pay for it directly.

Reimagining the future of Ride On

Finally, the budget includes continued funding for MCDOT to reimagine how bus service operates in Montgomery County. The $1.5 million was first allocated in the FY21 budget, but the process is still in its early stages. It is expected to pick up this summer and continue throughout the next year. The study will review how the Ride On network can best respond to changes in the county’s population, demographics, and land use and will examine route structures, connectivity, route spans, service frequency, and the transition to electric buses.

The reimagining study has the potential to build off of the county’s past and current investments in transit to make bus service even more desirable, equitable, and sustainable in the coming years. Ride On has not been comprehensively redesigned in over 20 years and its goals and objectives haven’t been updated since its 2008 Strategic Transit Plan.

The new study is an opportunity to guide future transit investments and operations. Right now, we’re getting back to the status quo, with some improvements; the upcoming study is an opportunity to guide future transit investments and operations while improving transit equity, supporting transit workers, and reducing greenhouse gas emissions from transportation.