Buried at the bottom of yesterday's WaPo story about the $1.5 billion funding package for Metro passed by the Senate is this juicy tidbit:The bill also includes a provision to improve cellphone coverage in the subway system. Within one year, the 20 busiest underground Metro stations would be required to have cellphone access for all carriers. Currently, only Verizon or Sprint roaming customers can receive signals.The last we heard about plans to build an expanded......

The long-delayed bill which includes a potential $1.5 billion in funding for Metrorail will finally be voted on in the Senate tomorrow, and it is expected to pass. Debate on the floor was officially closed by a 69-17 vote yesterday, and it would appear that the legislation has more than enough votes to make it's way to President Bush's desk. Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.) is probably finding the bill more difficult to roadblock these days,......

Metro brings word that yesterday, the House of Representatives approved an amended version of the Rail Safety Improvement Act of 2008 and the Passenger Rail Investment and Improvement Act of 2008, H.R. 2095. While the bill's main financial purpose is to allocate $13.06 billion in federal funds over the next five years to Amtrak, it also includes $1.5 billion in appropriations for Metro to make capital improvements in the next ten years - vital funds......

The clock is ticking for Metro. The transit agency announced on Monday that it will require $11.3 billion to keep things moving smoothly, according to a recently completed inventory of estimated needs between 2010 and 2020. The figure doesn't include possible expansion, and only six percent would go to "customer-oriented improvements." It's not big news that WMATA says money is short and that a great many things are needed, but the depth and unbelievably short......

The amount of miles logged by Maryland, Virginia, and District drivers fell sharply in May, contributing to a national drop of more than 9.6 billion miles, the third largest slide in the country's history. The decrease saw local drivers notching between 1.7 and 4.2 percent fewer turns of the odometer. So, you might ask, what's this got to do with Metro? Well, lots. The conclusions that we can draw from this drop are many -......

Dr. No has struck again. Yesterday the Senate was unable to pass a legislative package of 35 programs worth $10 billion that had been held up by Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Ok.). The package -- known as the "Tomnibus" bill -- included $1.5 billion for Metro that Coburn deemed wasteful because his constituents are too poor to come to Washington (no, seriously). But Democrats couldn't convince enough Republicans to join them to push the measure through,......

If you're a press secretary for Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Ok.), today's a good day. Both the Post and the New York Times are running profiles on the senator, affably known as "Dr. No," for his persistent opposition to bills that fund government programs he considers wasteful. Coburn has held up some 80 bills during his tenure, and it's gotten so bad that Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) felt compelled to introduce legislation last week......

After last week's Metropocalypse, we all took in the reports as to how major loss of service happens, and the fallout after the fact. But nothing really hit the nail on the head like Lena H. Sun's half-report, half-plea for the future. Sun touches on most of the points that seem (at least to us) to be regurgitated over and over these days: Metro's infrastructure is old - trains are past their primes, overworked stud......

It's been quite a week for the Orange line, with three long delays in three days (not to mention last week's storm-related delays). Monday's derailment of a train between the Rosslyn and Court House stations left people clamoring for a way to get home, but luckily, it wasn't as severe as it could have been. Of course, no one would argue that being stuck in a tunnel for a long time with air conditioning on......

There tends to be a lot of attention given to the state of bicycling to maneuver this city's streets, and rightfully so. But what about those of us who don't have the benefit of a manpowered two-wheeler to ride to work? After all, recent statistics show that 11.8 percent of D.C. walks to work, compared to the 2 percent who pedal. Well, DDOT has us people on feet in mind. On Tuesday, the agency released......

Hopefully, you didn't miss us too much last week. But it seems that we weren't the only transit columnists that got stuck on Amtrak during last weekend's travel. WTOP's Adam Tuss writes a sadly typical tale about his Amtrak train to New York's Penn Station breaking down twice and eventually stopping permanently in Newark, New Jersey, due to multiple power failures. This happened on Amtrak's National Train Day promotion, no less. Cute. While Amtrak didn't......

Sigh. Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.), he of the efforts to add an income test to D.C.'s tuition assistance program and paint WMATA as irresponsible baby killers, is back, this time with an op-ed in the Washington Times. In case you hadn't heard, Coburn feels strongly that the D.C. Metro system shouldn't get another dime from the federal government. In the column, Coburn argues that continuing to allow WMATA to get federal subsidies only removes any......