Weekend rains forced Metro to close two stations, single-track dozens of trains, and create “bus bridges” between several stations for thousands of frustrated commuters Monday as workers pumped tens of thousands of gallons of water from the deluged system.
But you would never know there were problems from Metro’s performance report, which showed 97.42 percent of Monday’s 610,004 riders “experienced no delay.” The number, which gets reported daily, actually shows Monday as being one of the better days to ride in the past two weeks.
So what exactly is this number? How does the transit agency compute it? Does it accurately reflect the efficiency of the system which makes an estimated 37,000 stops on the average weekday?
“On a daily basis, when there is full-service, it’s pretty good,” said Metro spokeswoman Candace Smith. “But there should probably be a greater explanation of how we measure that on days like Monday.”
Steven Feil, Metro’s chief operating officer for rail, said the electronic-monitoring system only measures if trains arrive at stations on time according to a daily schedule. The schedule shifts depending on the number of cars available and also incorporates delays created by scheduled maintenance.
This means trains that never arrived because the stations were closed because of flooding were not included in the number. None of the 10,800 people who typically use the Federal Triangle station or the 8,400 people who enter the Archives-Navy Memorial station were counted.
Also uncounted were the tens of thousands of people forced to exit the system and use the shuttle service or find other transportation between Metro Center and Smithsonian stations and Gallery Place-Chinatown and L’Enfant Plaza stations.
Officials said the number is based on the service available and said the number accurately reflects the efficiency of the “modified service.”
Smith said the agency will change the wording and add more information to make it more accurately reflect the customer’s “experience.”
