On Sundays, DCist publishes opinion pieces about life in D.C. We’re keeping it in the family today, as the following column was written by my cousin, Rajiv Shah. If you have an opinion to share, please email us.

Metro Board Chairwoman Gladys Mack’s recent apology and pronouncements to improve customer service by the newly inducted WMATA Director Dan Tangherlini, reported in Friday’s Washington Post, will do little to assuage the ire of MetroAccess’s riders. As a visually impaired client of this paratransit service, mandated to transport disabled individuals since the mid-90’s, I have witnessed three changes in the contractual guard, which have yielded nothing more than cosmetic shifts in service. The same laundry list of problems present in 1996– chronic truancy by drivers in picking up clients, personnel insensitivity to customers’ needs and Metro’s hesitancy to address these underlying issues—continues to plague this system today.

I regularly use MetroAccess to commute to my workplace in Southwest Washington from my Fairfax town home. Typically, during these trips, clients are expected to share rides, meaning that a driver might retrieve a person from Reston, VA, prior to my pickup, and an individual from Arlington following me. It is, therefore, not uncommon that these tours across town can last up to an-hour-and-a half when combined with the vagaries of rush-hour traffic. Add to this the multiplier effect of a client showing up late or a lost driver delayed while attempting to find a location, and you have an explosive recipe for frustration on both sides of the table.