Monday bus commuters woke up to a new bus system to figure out.
Prince George’s County, Maryland, launched its bus redesign at the same time Metro completed a major overhaul of its bus system.
While Metro has said this is one of the most significant overhauls in decades, there’s still room for changes if needed.
“Overwhelmingly, people in this region are going to get better bus service,” Metro General Manager Randy Clarke told WTOP’s Luke Lukert at Metro’s Downtown Largo Station.
Metro has changed hundreds of bus routes, route names and times, beginning Sunday morning.
Clarke said the transit agency reviewed 45,000 rider comments during the three or so years of designing the new bus system overhaul. Metro purposely implemented the new system the week of the Fourth of July holiday.
“We wanted to do it in, if you will, the quietest time for bus operations. And so that allows us to get all of our staff trained, all the feedback,” Clarke said.
The work isn’t done.
“We’re going to be taking a lot of feedback throughout this process, we’ll be analyzing the data tightly,” he added.
Any major changes to routes or bus services would likely need to wait until December, but frequency changes on existing routes may change based on the popularity of those routes.
“People want more frequency and more reliability,” he said.
TheBus gets a redesign, too
Meanwhile, in tandem with the Metrobus changes, Prince George’s County also launched its major redesign for TheBus.
Prince George’s County Executive Aisha Braveboy said TheBus will now offer more reliable service and redesigned routes that will reduce wait times.
Many of the routes will stay the same, while others will see minor or major changes. They also introduced entirely new routes.
“For the first time ever, TheBus will serve Bowie, Fairwood, Adelphi, Friendly and Fort Washington, connecting more residents to jobs, schools and medical facilities,” Braveboy said.
Bus routes will now also have consistent naming starting with the letter “P” for Prince George’s County.
Braveboy said “free service continues” for TheBus.
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