The funding gap exceeds 5 billion, and the Washington subway cuts its budget： it stops at 10 o’clock, closes its stations and lays off 2,000 people.

According to the latest report of American media on December 12th, Randy Clarke, general manager of Washington Metro, warned that if the budget gap of up to $750 million could not be made up in the first half of 2024, subway services and jobs would be greatly reduced.

According to public information, the Washington Metro is the second busiest urban rail transit system in the United States, second only to the new york Metro, which started operation in 1976. The service scope is roughly the core city of Washington metropolitan area, including Washington, D.C. and some cities and regions adjacent to Maryland.

In the past few months, the Washington subway system has been sounding the alarm and anticipating the potential impact of insufficient funds. At this week’s media briefing, Randy Clark provided more details on his proposed "balanced but sharply cut" budget for next year:

The subway will end its operation ahead of schedule, and all stations will be closed at 10 pm. At present, the subway basically operates until midnight or later. In addition, ten stations will be closed according to the passenger flow. The subway frequency will be reduced. At present, most subway trains run every six minutes or less, but if the funding situation does not improve in July next year, 90% of the intervals will be extended.

In addition, the "Metropolitan Bus" in the Washington subway system will also be greatly reduced. According to the proposed budget, 67 of the existing 135 lines will be cancelled; The service of the other 41 lines will be reduced. One third of bus services in Washington, D.C., Maryland and Virginia will be cut.

Other measures include a 20% increase in ticket prices and parking fees, and plans to lay off more than 2,200 people.

The huge budget gap is related to the problem of special funds in Washington, D.C., Maryland and Virginia; Due to inflation, low passenger flow and rising costs, five subway stations have laid off employees this month because of "unprecedented budget challenges".

Some American media exaggerated the above plan as "doomsday scene", but this is not all. The proposed budget of Washington Metro in FY 2025 said: "If there is no sustainable and predictable source of funds to replace the federal relief funds, the proposed budget of FY 2025 will present an unrecognizable subway because of unprecedented service cuts to make up for the operating deficit."