Municipal budgets are shrinking, and cities and states across the country and coming up with any number of creative solutions to draw in additional revenue—including corporate ads and sponsorships.

Photo by maria jpeg Heads up. The second round of Metro fare increases to bridge a $189 million budget gap starts today. Below you’ll find a round up of the changes, adding on to those implemented last month. Unfortunately, if anyone were hoping for an uneventful rollout of the increases — I guess you haven’t been living in D.C. for very long — then sorry to dash your dreams; the “peak of the peak”…

Photo by Kevin H. We’ve finally got the details on the fare hike agreement reached by Metro’s Board of Directors that we reported earlier. The following fare changes are expected to go into effect on June 27, pending final approval of the 2011 budget on June 24. Metrorail: The regular peak base fare will go up from $1.65 to $1.95, an 18 percent increase. That’s also five cents more than the board’s original proposal….