Chip Taylor

Government enterprise

From the Washington Post:

After encouraging the public to buy SmarTrip cards by installing SmarTrip fare boxes on more than 1,000 buses, placing SmarTrip vending machines in 33 stations and requiring their use by anyone parking at a Metro lot, the transit system is running out of cards.

Metro officials said yesterday that they will stop selling the rechargeable, plastic fare cards Monday and will not resume sales until new supplies arrive in September. They had already ceased online sales Wednesday.

...

Until SmarTrip card sales resume, anyone who parks at a Metro lot or garage and doesn't have a SmarTrip card must purchase a paper fare card at a station for the exact amount of the parking fee. That fare card must be handed to a parking attendant at the exit lanes.

Metro must hire 48 additional parking attendants to handle those transactions, at a cost of $34,000 a week, said Ray Stoner, who oversees Metro's parking program.

"I just think we're going to have an awfully hard time trying to explain this," said Gladys Mack, who represents the District on the Metro board. "This is a tremendous inconvenience for the customer."

Indeed.