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The "soft" part of the launch of the city's new Circulator bus routes came to an end today, as D.C. Mayor Adrian Fenty, D.C. Council member Jim Graham (D-Ward 1), and DDOT acting director Gabe Klein all came out to 18th Street and Columbia Road NW this morning for an official ceremony to kickoff the new bus lines.
The routes replace the now discontinued 98 and N22 Metrobus routes, while adding additional connectivity between downtown, U Street, Columbia Heights and Mt. Pleasant on the Woodley Park/Adams Morgan - McPherson Square route.
"We're saying to District of Columbia residents, as much as possible, get out of your cars," Mayor Fenty said at the ceremony this morning.
In a funnier moment of the otherwise standard ribbon cutting event-style remarks, Council member Graham alluded to his receiving criticism for his reliance on his personal automobile.
"Jim Graham, did you hear that? Whoops!" Graham said of himself.
After the Adams Morgan ceremony, Fenty, Graham and Klein all boarded a Circulator bus and headed to Matchbox on Barracks Row to mark the opening of the Union Station - Navy Yard route.
The new Nationals mascot, a thinner, taller version of Screech, was also on hand for the ceremony, sporting a DDOT florescent vest and helping to direct the Circulator buses as they pulled away from the ceremony.
Another new city bus route, the S9 Express Metrobus line, formally launched on Monday.
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"We're saying to District of Columbia residents, as much as possible, get out of your cars," Mayor Fenty said at the ceremony this morning.
....right before he hopped into his car and disappeared, only to emerge a week later wearing a keffiyeh, covered in Neat's Foot Oil, and singing the Horst Wessel Song in Yiddish.
I rode on the Green line Circulator yesterday from Mount Pleasant and Pleasant is wasn't. We got caught up in that
traffic light out fiasco on 14th street, so I sat on the bus for 45 mintutes. Today, I hope that problem is fixed.
when i read the words "soft launch" i think of Monkey's trebuchet.
If there's a form of mass transit that has a lower carbon footprint than a trebuchet, I haven't seen it.
Solar Powered electric AT-ATs win every time. It's only weakness are biomass snow speeders.
I'm surprised the driver didn't stop the bus and give Screech a cockpunch.
And the grahamstander and shot to the McGruff.
Someone please, quick, call the police!. An imposter posing as Jim Graham was seen on a bus yesterday.
Sorry! Those were my sock puppets. Pretty good, huh?
Someone better mark this day in history because I'm sure this is the last time we'll see the Grahamstander on the Circulator. Of course the real story (ahem Sommer) would have been to get on the Circulator with them and then see how they all got back to the Wilson Building from Barracks Row...I bet they didn't even carpoool...
Yes, in an ideal world, I'd be able to spend 3 hours of my day to get a single blog post. Instead, I can generally be away from the computer for no more than 45 minutes without DCist falling off its publishing schedule. Them's the breaks on the interwebs.
45 minutes you say? just enough time for 9 quickies! or 5 quickies depending on various fudge factors.
Mmmmm...fudge quickies. The sweetest taboo.
Hell, we commenters are doing most of the work here.
And thus why ultimately, the new-fangled Web media will never be better than TV or print...nothing personal of course.
Does that mean Morning Round Up is supposed to be published by a certain time? Why does it vary so much? (Hooray for when Tom does it, and it's actually up before 10am)
Yeah, Sommer! Why can't you read the news, identify relevant articles, and summarize them at a time that's most convenient for me for the low low price of nothing? And why the hell doesn't DCist bring me coffee and make my breakfast in the morning? And where are my three wishes!! If they're not here by 8:30 am sharp, I'm going to complain even more! PERHAPS IN ALL CAPS!
Actually, Sommer does get paid to edit DCist, none of the other contributors do. So I figure if they can get a post up before 9:30, so should she. It's the way the crazy working world works.
I would still read DCist if it cost twice as much.
I decided to take the Circulator out for a spin yesterday, so I hopped on at 14th and P streets around 7:30 last night and found myself deposited, 20 minutes later, in front of the Woodley Park Metro station. In other words, it worked like a charm.
They did still seem to be working out the kinks, because my driver stopped (seemingly) at the wrong place on Adams Mill Rd. No biggie though...any transit service that gets me door-to-door from Logan to Woodley, while passing through Columbia Heights and Adams-Morgan, in 20 minutes--and all for $1--is OK in my book.
Oh, and to those who are already clamoring for more stops along the new line, I say fye. The new Circulator route is functioning exactly as it was designed to: essentially as a streetcar with limited, key stops. Yeah, I had to walk a couple of blocks to get to it, but it only made three stops on its route to Woodley. So, hooray, something that actually works. Now leave it alone!
AMEN! On Monday's commute home the driver allowed 4 different people to get off along the way from P St. to Columbia Rd. It was certainly not the "express" I had hoped for.
Looks like Fenty must have spent all that time out of town at a Goofy Old Man Hat Expo.
...in the Dominican Republic.
Hey! Someday that Fenty kangol will be prominently displayed in the DC Council museum alongside several unfinished Barry tax returns and a pamphlet titled 'Your 2008-9 Guide to Michael Browns in DC Politics'.
Does the Mayor look younger and thinner than he did before his unexplained absence? Pehaps he was in Port-au-Prince for a round of stem cell colonics and voodoo age reduction therapy.
That voodoo colonics story is just heresay! Obviously, he's had a parasitic twin removed. Unfortunately, the dead-bird-sealed-in-soap that is an essential part of the "cleansing" ritual never arrived. Unless he can get another before the next full moon, the mayor will turn back into a pumpkin. Or a werewolf. Either way, he won't explain where he went last Arbor Day.
maybe he was @ one of these?
www.marathonguide.com/races/races.cfm?Sort=RaceDate&Place=USA&StartDate=1%2F28%2F09
I dunno. He strikes me as the type to attend the Bataan Memorial Death March, but he looks healthy and rejuvenated, not starving and brutalized.
That one does sound awesome.
heyyy 98 bus! that's garbage. my beloved 98 short bus is discontinued? gone? i mean, i know the brakes were squeaky and all, but sometimes that little thing was the only one to beat traffic. those big circulator busses just add to the whole 18th and U street mess, which includes like, 10 other bus lines.
those big circulator busses just add to the whole 18th and U street mess, which includes like, 10 other bus lines.
Hence, the new Circulator route going up 14th and not down U towards 18th (and up 18th).
Um actually it's only four lines on 18th Street during most hours and five during rush hour (90/92/96/L2/X3). Sorry, just had to let my bus geek flag fly.
"And so I'd like to announce that the vehicle behind me, what you call the aut-o-bus, will begin traveling up the a commonly used street, then going on a different street, with a few opportunities along the way for people on the aut-o-bus, who we refer to as "riders", to exit and enter the large conveyance. It will then commence a form of returning via the same route. This unprecedented use of technology will allow more of us to be not here now, but be there then. Thank you and in the name ram das, ride on."
that's probably not far from reality. Fenty has a way with words as Barry has a way with taxes.
"It's important for all of us well-paid public servants to spend some hours announcing that a resource we already have has been redistributed to a slightly different location. Hopefully none of you will point out that this is nothing more than a bus—the thing with wheels equipped with crazed, drugged out, violent offender in charge—going up and down a different road. It's amazing to see that the same bus..can go on a different street! I thought we'd have to order entirely new buses to go down these other streets!! We're friggin geniuses!"
It's a 'circulator' not an express bus. The primary purpose isn't to get people around as quickly as possible, but to connect neighborhoods. I'm of the opinion that a few more stops are definitely needed, and I'm hoping as more people use it, they will be eventually introduced. Look at the other established Circulator routes--they have more stops.
There needs to be additional stop along 14th between U & P, and another one between U st and Columbia Heights (it's almost a mile between the two current bus stops).
Why are there 3 stops (according to the map) around Franklin Square? 2 of those should be eliminated.
Did Gabe Klein borrow his girlfriend's coat?
Aurelgrooves, one driver told me that there would be short buses on the green circulator line, like the 98s but new. I haven't heard about it anywhere else, though. I blame Sommer, who should have already heard this rumor and infiltrated DDOT HQ to confirm or deny. I also blame her for not providing a picture of the new short bus, not even a wobbly through-the-bushes paparazzi shot of a disguised one doing track agility tests.
Aurelgrooves, one driver told me that there would be short buses on the green circulator line, like the 98s but new. I haven't heard about it anywhere else, though. I blame Sommer, who should have already heard this rumor and infiltrated DDOT HQ to confirm or deny. I also blame her for not providing a picture of the new short bus, not even a wobbly through-the-bushes paparazzi shot of a disguised one doing track agility tests.
That was indeed a short bus in my photo! They are 30 feet long instead of 40 feet. Maybe not as short as you were imagining? They are not as short as the 98 bus, but are definitely shorter than the regular buses.
When possible, the length of the bus should be commensurate with it's name. 32 bus = 32 foot long bus. 98 bus = 98 foot long triple bendy bus.
Is that why it says "special"?
The one claustrophobic thing about riding on the Circulator buses is that You are at the mercy of the driver
for climate control. Them windows don't open so's if you're on the bus with some funky stuff. You gotta grin and bear it.
Can't get enough....of that funky stuff.
Yeah, why do the circulator's windows open at the top? In the fall i always loved throwing acorns at little kids out of the windows on the 30. Guess come October I'll just have to bag riding the circulator.
Now you're just being a silly goose. What difference does it make when something is posted? Maybe Tom is an insomniac and Sommer has better things to do in the morning. In any event, it's free. If it bugs you that much, read a newspaper. Better yet, do the morning roundup yourself. I'm sure Sommer would appreciate the help.
By the way, by what time do the other Gothamist sites post their morning roundups? (Hint: it's a trap!)
Managed to catch one driver's first trip from Woodley up to Columbia Heights. Driver was exceedingly polite as he explained the new route to people; the trip was about 25 minutes. Pretty good time.
Would love to see them cut some corners: literally. It took about ten minutes to get from the corner of 16th and Harvard up Mt. Pleasant street to Irving and 16th. Heck with that: save the time and make us walk a half block.
Do these actually run every 10 minutes as claimed on the website? Or provide some way to check arrivals?
The last two times I used the Georgetown loop I was waiting 30+ minutes- but admittedly that was about 5 months ago.
"The new routes provide greater connection for area residents and employees, businesses, and visitors to the multitude of cultural, nightlife, dining and shopping opportunities our neighborhoods offer."
The Union Station – Navy Yard line stops at 7pm and only runs on weekends. How is that helpful? I know the n22 didn' run on weekends either but this sounds dumb.