(The Associated Press circulated the following article by Brett Zongker on October 26.)
WASHINGTON — High fuel prices are forcing Virginia Railway Express to scale back train service running to the nation’s capital and cut other services, officials with the commuter rail service said Tuesday.
VRE ridership has grown by about 50,000 passengers over the past year, according to figures from the Northern Virginia Transportation Commission, but VRE planned to cut service for a train that had a consistently low number of riders.
Service was scheduled to end Nov. 28 for Manassas Line train 334, which arrives at Union Station each day at 11:30 a.m. The late morning train service typically only carries about 60 people at most due to limited parking by that time of day at train stations, VRE spokesman Mark Roeber said.
“It’s disheartening any time you have to change your operation in a way that technically feels like you’re reducing service rather than providing more,” Roeber said.
Extra cars likely would be added to other trains to make up for the loss, Roeber said.
“Just because we’re eliminating this train, no one should think that the system is actually slowing in its ridership growth,” Roeber said. “We still have a great demand for the service.”
VRE also announced plans to stop all service on Fridays after Thanksgiving each year, to reduce its afternoon cleaning schedule at train stations and adjust its maintenance program for further savings.
The cuts were expected to save VRE about $1 million dollars in the year ahead in response to a 77 percent increase in the cost of fuel. The railroad has a projected budget deficit of $1.2 million.
“We recognize that all of our riders may not support all of these changes,” VRE CEO Dale Zehner said. “We had to do something, and we didn’t want to make a fare increase the solution.”
While fuel prices have encouraged some commuters to take the train instead of area highways, VRE continues to struggle with limited parking space at many stations. Expansions at two station parking lots were expected to be complete by 2007.
“Transportation as a whole is dealing with being a victim of its own success,” said Kala Quintana, a spokeswoman for the Northern Virginia Transportation Commission. “This is an ongoing issue, and it’s one that we hope to deal with directly in the upcoming General Assembly session.”
State lawmakers have neglected mass transit but are beginning to realize that improvements could ease congestion on area roads, Quintana said.