Photo by Adam Fagen.

The price of riding a Circulator bus has not changed since the service was founded in 2005, but the District Department of Transportation has long wanted to change that.

“At a dollar, we have very low fare box return,” Carl Jackson, then associate director of DDOT’s Progressive Transportation Services Administration, told DCist earlier this year. At the time, Jackson said DDOT planned to ask the mayor’s office to raise the $1 fare to $2 for cash and $1.75 for SmarTrip.

But an increase won’t happen until a public process that includes at least one meeting and an implementation plan is completed, according to new regulations proposed by the agency.

A fare or service adjustment plan would have to include “a summary of the proposed fare adjustment or service adjustment; a proposed timeline for the implementation of the fare adjustment or service adjustment; an equity analysis illustrating any disparate impact of the proposed fare adjustment or service adjustment on populations protected under Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964; and an explanation of the necessity of the fare adjustment or service adjustment and description of alternative fare or service scenarios examined.”

After at least one public meeting, and if DDOT decides a fare increase should be implemented, a plan with the final timeline and plan of action would be published on DDOT’s websites. “The implementation plan shall include a summary of the public comments received and DDOT’s responses to the comments,” the regulation states.

Public comment on the regulations can be sent to publicspace.policy@dc.gov by November 1. If the regulations are accepted, we’ve checked with DDOT to see how soon after an increase may be proposed. We’ll update when we hear back.