Tomorrow morning, the WMATA board’s Finance and Administration Committee will review a plan to significantly widen the intervals between Metrorail trains on weekends in order to close a $72 million budget gap without raising fares.

WMATA’s board of directors caused quite a stir last Friday when D.C. representative Tom Downs and head of rail operations Dave Kubicek floated the possibility of rolling back closing time to 11 p.m. on Friday and Saturday evenings in an effort to save money and gain precious maintenance time. Riders were angry, bars and restaurants got worried –frankly, the only people not disgusted with the prospect are taxi drivers. But this is hardly the first time such an idea has been bandied about — in fact, it appears to be something that comes up every couple of years, only to be washed away in a sea of heavy opposition.

Photo by Samer Farha. No? That’s a shame, folks, because Metro’s got a bigtime to-do list of track work on tap during the next four weekends, seemingly affecting every single line. The schedule includes some big projects: for instance, bridge maintenance outside the Stadium-Armory station, Red Line tunnel repairs, and plenty of switch replacement. The last weekend in June looks especially prickly, with five projects scheduled over the weekend in advance of the Fourth…

Exciting news from DCist HQ! Starting tomorrow, you’ll be able to check in with DCist over the weekend and find actual new content! We’ve brought on occasional guest blogger and art lad Kriston Capps and DCist transit columnist extraordinaire Aaron Morrissey to be our new weekend editors. What can you expect to see on DCist on Saturdays and Sundays now? Along with our usual brand of local news and arts coverage, you’ll also be…