Photo by webhamster on Flickr.

Last year’s budget season was full of emergency appeals to save Metro. This year, there have been none.

Yes, Metro has a budget gap this year. As it did last year, and the year before.

Early projections said that if fares and jurisdictional contributions stayed the same as this year, Metro would be $74 million short of the money it needed to maintain the same level of service. But instead of threatening disastrous service cuts or huge fare increases, Metro proposed a budget where that money came from the entire community, via increases in contributions from state and local governments.

Several local jurisdictions endorsed the required increase in jurisdictional contributions up front. Arlington and Fairfax’s budgets included the increases. Last week, Maryland’s representatives to the WMATA Board announced that they, too, would come up with the extra contributions. A few days ago, Alexandria dedicated some of its property tax revenue to the needed Metro funding.

The WMATA Board approved a docket for public hearings with relatively few cuts. Late-night cuts, the worst of the initial proposals, are off the table. DC routes E6, K1, and N8 could still be eliminated, and some fares to Anacostia station increased.

There’s still an option to increase weekend headways to 18 minutes Saturdays, 20 minutes Sundays, and 25 minutes both Saturdays and Sundays after 9:30 pm. They would cause real damage to Metro and to the economy of the entire region. Riders should forcefully oppose these cuts. But the amount of money involved is relatively small — only $6 million. We are in the realm of reasonable debate rather than fighting off catastrophe.

While in past years the WMATA Board has delayed decisions on the budget until DC made its decisions as well, this year DC’s representatives approved a docket for public hearings that almost forces it to come up with more money for Metro, even though that money hasn’t been publicly identified yet.

That share, after the bus cuts, comes to $13.3 million, in a budget that already treats transportation well while making painful cuts for needy residents in areas like affordable housing. Most likely, Tommy Wells’ Committee on Public Works and Transportation will need to find that money through revenue increases like graduated RPP fees or the free parking loophole.

Much remains to be done to improve Metro’s policymaking. Long-term planning of budgets and service is not what it should be. Local governments still ignore the costs they dump on Metro when they make land use and traffic engineering decisions.

But the new Metro board’s approach to the budget puts us ahead of where we were a year ago on these questions too. Transit’s needs are now getting put on the table, just as highway departments do their job by pointing out deficiencies in the road network. There is a chance to begin an honest dialogue about priorities among elected officials and the public.

The hearings are May 16 in Hyattsville (by New Carrollton Metro), May 17 in Alexandria (Braddock Road Metro) and upper northwest DC (Friendship Heights/Tenleytown Metro), May 18 in Arlington (Court House) and Wheaton, and May 19 in Barry Farm (Anacostia Metro). All hearings will start with an open house at 5:30, a town hall format at 6, and the formal public hearing at 6:45.

By all means, oppose the weekend rail cuts and call for preserving needed bus service. But it’s also worth thanking the Board for what’s right about this year’s budget process.