Metro officials got tough questions Wednesday about the future of the “nation’s subway,” as members of a House Oversight subcommittee quizzed them about how the system may survive in an age with increased telework.
Before the pandemic, nearly 40 percent of peak-hour rail riders were federal employees, and it remains to be seen exactly how many of those workers will return to their old commutes.
“Will they come back? No one knows of course, but will they come back to the scale that we were? I doubt it,” said Paul J. Wiedefeld, general manager of the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority. “As a region, we need to rethink what we want the system to be, but it does more than just serve those trips. It serves the entire community.”
