Photo by johnny greengrass.

Ah, Chinatown buses: chariots of the frugal, the thrifty, the person looking for the cheapest possible way to get up and down the Eastern Seaboard. It’s almost a rite of passage to take at least one spin on the various bus lines which originate from and stop in the District — and even with the ascent of corporate-backed, low-cost, modern-amenity lines like BoltBus and Megabus, people are still scraping out a Jackson to get to New York on the fly. But while more competition might not have sunk the dirt-cheap bus business, a new District law just might.

The main reason that Chinatown lines can keep prices so low is because, unlike other bus lines with dedicated depots, they have very litte overhead cost. But as WAMU reports, new regulations going into effect this summer will allow the city to start charging discount bus lines to use curbside space to pick up and drop off passengers:

Starting this summer, the District will have new regulations that allow it to charge bus companies a public space rental fee of $80,000 a year or more.

[Pete Pantuso, head of the American Bus Association] says this fee will be passed along to the riders in the form of higher prices. And he says D.C. is using a booming local industry as an ATM.

“It’s very, very clear that the District is looking for money,” [Pantuso] says.

The regulation leads reporter David Schultz to conclude that “the days of hopping on a bus in Chinatown and head straight to the Big Apple for just a few dollars are probably numbered.” Indeed, $80,000 per year for operations which likely don’t generate a ton of cash will certainly be a blow — and it’s easy to think that many lines will simply balk at paying the fee and move operations elsewhere.

Of course, the bad news for Chinatown buses is good news for other bus lines. Take Tripper Bus and Vamoose, for example — both lines run service to New York from Arlington and Bethesda. And since neither stops in the District, they’d avoid the curb fee. Of course, one imagines that every other discount bus line with enough cash to have a depot in D.C. will be looking to lure in the potential customers left behind by departing Chinatown lines.

There’s also the real question we must ask: does anyone actually voluntarily choose to take a Chinatown bus? For all its street cred as the starving artists’ preferred mode of transport, riding a super-low-cost bus can be a real struggle: many have several stops which tack on extra time to trips, and customer service is usually an unheard of luxury. If the fee does kill a large amount of D.C.’s super-cheap bus lines, will you be among those mourning?