Virginia Gov.-elect Ralph Northam’s victory, along with significant Democratic gains in the state legislature, could help overcome the regional political rifts that have stymied efforts to find a long-term source of dedicated funding for Metro, agency and elected officials said this week.

Amid a political stalemate that pitted the District against its tax-averse neighbors, an unexpectedly large Democratic gain of at least 15 seats in the Virginia House of Delegates could shift the balance of power in the GOP-controlled chamber, all but erasing one of the steepest roadblocks to dedicated funding.

Metro board member Christian Dorsey described Tuesday’s election results as “a game changer” in the fight for long-term funding. Dorsey, a Democrat who also is a member of the Arlington County Board, said the results mean dedicated funding has gone from having “no shot to having a possibility” in the state.

“It doesn’t guarantee anything, but just to be able to have a realistic opportunity to make the case and hopefully not have institutional resistance to it — that’s more than anybody could have expected 48 hours ago,” Dorsey said Wednesday. “You’re looking at a landscape that is much more favorable than it was a few days ago.”

Northam has said he supports dedicated funding for the transit agency, though he has not advocated a specific funding mechanism. His campaign did not immediately respond to a request to comment.

In a related development, some top area officials signaled it will probably be necessary for the region to adopt stopgap, “bridge funding” for Metro for the fiscal year that begins July 1. That’s because it won’t be politically possible to agree on dedicated funding by then — even with the political shift in the Virginia legislature.

A statement at Wednesday’s meeting of the Metropolitan Washington Council of Governments (COG) marked a setback for the group’s hope that dedicated funding could be approved in the Virginia and Maryland legislative sessions that begin in January.

The COG statement quickly drew criticism from a coalition of business and nonprofit groups, who urged action on the issue in early 2018.

In Virginia, Gov. Terry McAuliffe (D) has said he will propose a dedicated funding source for Metro when he presents his final budget as governor in December — though he did not explicitly endorse a new tax or say how much additional money he wants to raise. The gesture was viewed then as largely symbolic because of the uncertainty of the election.

Metro General Manager Paul J. Wiedefeld says he needs $15.5 billion over 10 years to keep the system safe and reliable. He also says that should include an additional $500 million a year in dedicated funding, on top of what regional governments have been providing, for equipment and maintenance.

A uniform regional sales tax, the mechanism preferred by the District and endorsed by a COG technical panel, was regarded a nonstarter in the GOP-controlled Virginia General Assembly as well as among many elected officials of both parties in Northern Virginia.

Tuesday’s results may change that, supporters say, because it will be easier to win approval of some other tax or dedicated funding.

“If [Northam’s] got an almost Democratic-controlled house, that gives him a leg up that [McAuliffe] didn’t have,” Metro board chairman Jack Evans said. “I think that’s a real positive sign, and I’m real happy.”

Republicans retain narrow control of the Virginia Senate, with 21 seats to the Democrats’ 19.

Evans (D), who also is a D.C. Council member, co-introduced council legislation this week for a 0.75 percent sales tax dedicated to Metro. The measure is contingent upon Virginia and Maryland doing the same.

Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan (R), who has said he won’t raise taxes for Metro, instead proposed providing the agency with $2 billion over four years, split evenly among the District, Maryland, Virginia and the federal government. But the plan has been criticized because it is a short-term solution.

Fairfax County Board of Supervisors Chairman Sharon Bulova (D) also was optimistic in light of the state election results.

“While they may not yet have seniority, they are supportive of the Democrat positions for more funding, more needed funding for Metro,” Bulova said. “This is a really positive sign and a very positive outcome for Metro — for Metro funding.”

Wiedefeld praised Northam’s stance on dedicated funding in a brief statement this week.

“We are grateful for the Governor Elect’s strong support of Metro’s funding needs and look forward to working with him,” Wiedefeld said.

But Northern Virginia Republicans cautioned that the loss of agency supporters from their side of the aisle could mean that Metro issues won’t have the ear of leadership. GOP losses mean the Republican delegation in Richmond has even less skin in the game when it comes to Metro, Loudoun County Supervisor Matthew F. Letourneau (R-Dulles) said.

“It was a tremendous loss, both in terms of past achievements and also in terms of prospects for the future,” Letourneau said. “They were the individuals who I think were most likely to be able to forge compromise and work with Republican leadership in the House and the Senate to find Metro solutions. Without them being there, it’s going to be more challenging.”

The Republican voices on Metro who lost Tuesday include Del. James M. LeMunyon (Fairfax), who was upset by Karrie Delaney (D), and Del. J. Randall Minchew (Loudoun), who fell to Wendy Gooditis (D). Another influential Republican from the area, Del. David B. Albo (Fairfax), announced before the election that he was retiring. Democrat Kathy Tran defeated Republican Lolita Mancheno-Smoak in the race for Albo’s seat.

D.C. Council Chairman Phil Mendelson (D-At Large) was enthusiastic about the potential ramifications of Northam’s win, but said the impact remains to be seen.

“I’m hopeful that the election means that there are people who are much friendlier to the region, and much more receptive to the idea of a dedicated tax,” Mendelson said.

But Mendelson acknowledged that the loss of moderate, Metro-friendly Republicans in Northern Virginia could make it more difficult to gain traction in the legislature — or maybe not.

“If they’re not there, that strategy becomes more difficult. But on the other hand, if the Assembly has flipped, then it’s not an issue. But then there can be Democrats who are reluctant about raising taxes,” Mendelson said. “All that can be said with certainty is that it looks like it will be easier to discuss the dedicated regional tax in Richmond.”

There are a handful of races that are still too close to call.

“Obviously if the Democrats control the House, that’s probably a much different dynamic,” Letourneau said. “They’ll have presumably the ear of their leadership and be able to work on something.”

He said any new funding will almost certainly have to be paired with governance changes, which have been endorsed by both Republicans and Democrats in Richmond. Former U.S. transportation secretary Ray LaHood is expected to recommend a sweeping overhaul of the agency’s governance, including a three-year, five-member “reform board,” in an upcoming study ordered by McAuliffe.

Asked about the urgency of securing dedicated funding by fellow panel members, Dorsey laid out the stakes at the COG meeting Wednesday. “If, at the end of the day, Mr. Wiedefeld doesn’t get what [Metro has] validated are the needs, we have to take very seriously the fact that he may not be there long-term.”

COG’s Metro Strategy Group issued the statement warning that dedicated funding probably won’t be in agreed upon in time for the coming fiscal year. The group, led by Bulova, includes senior officials from the jurisdictions that fund Metro.

The group said its “ultimate goal” remains “a permanent, long-term dedicated funding solution enacted as expeditiously as possible.”

However, should that not happen right away, it said, “It is critical that the region maintains its momentum and commits to a significant down payment — ‘bridge funding’ to mix metaphors a bit — to assure Metro’s capital needs are fully covered in FY 2019.”

The group acknowledged it faces major disagreements over what kind of tax or other mechanism should be adopted to provide dedicated funding.

“We knew this would be a complicated task,” said the statement, delivered by COG Vice Chairman Derrick L. Davis (D), who also chairs the Prince George’s County Council.

The prospect of a one-year delay in approving dedicated funding was criticized by the coalition of business groups and nonprofits that support Metro.

“A one-year funding patch for Metro repairs is shortsighted and does not prioritize the system or a long-term solution,” the coalition said. “Taking action in the legislative sessions starting in January 2018 is critical. We cannot delay until 2019 when the needs today are so urgent.”

The statement was signed by business groups including the Federal City Council, Greater Washington Board of Trade, 2030 Group and Greater Washington Partnership, as well as nonprofits including the Coalition for Smarter Growth and Greater Greater Washington.

“A temporary stopgap measure is simply not sufficient to support the types of changes necessary to bring Metro — and the regional economy as a whole — into the future effectively,” the coalition said. “Voters are expecting our elected leaders to stand up and lead.”

Martine Powers contributed to this report.

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It’s morning rush hour in the nation’s capital, and bicyclists crowd their lane six deep at an intersection. Clad in spandex and business suits, a few ride the bright green, orange, red or yellow bikes that signal a new phase of city cycling.

These shared bikes are part of an experimental network of dockless cycles.

Officials hope the pilot program changes how people get around. The District of Columbia boasts some positive results in its mission to curb gridlock and reduce pollution — like the most rapid rise in bike commuters among major cycling cities.

At stake are the city’s promises to tackle climate change and improve quality of life for its residents. Cities around the country are grappling with the same challenge as their populations rise: more cars.

Riders of these Skittle-colored new bikes unlock them using a phone app. They cost $1 an hour and can be left anywhere there’s room to drop a kickstand. That means colorful two-wheelers can be seen on sidewalks, on grassy terraces and, sometimes, in trees.

“I just saw this in front of my dorm, and I grabbed it to run to the bank because it’s a nice day and it’s faster,” said James Newell, an 18-year-old Howard University student. He was on an orange Mobike.

The new technology, which originated in China, is not limited to Washington: Seattle and San Francisco began pilots this summer. Dallas is home to three dockless bike-share companies. Boston is negotiating with firms right now.

But the sheer number of options in D.C. has made it ground zero for shared bikes. The wave began in 2007 with Capital Bikeshare, a system of docked cycles. Then came the dockless evolution: LimeBike, Mobike, oFo and Spin are four new privately funded companies. JUMP Mobility’s bikes, also new, have an electric motor, and they lock to pre-existing bike racks.

The five competing companies will duel for ridership over the next six months; they can deploy up to 400 bikes each, per their agreement with D.C. officials.

The city, facing a chicken-and-egg problem, is hoping to get more people on bikes. It is also planning to build 72 miles of protected bike lanes, more than double of what the city offers now.

“The truth is that biking in D.C. is kind of nerve-wracking,” said Alex Morgan, 29, a resident of D.C. and a gear-clad bike commuter who has not yet tried one of the new dockless bikes. “I think it’s better if more people bike so we can get more and better bike lanes and sharrows.”

ACTUAL CARBON SAVINGS?

Each company tells a rider how much carbon emissions they saved in a single ride. It’s not a coincidence.

Transportation is the second-largest source of carbon emissions in the D.C. area, behind buildings. The city aims to cut its greenhouse gas emissions 50 percent by 2032 and 80 percent by 2050.

The gradual development of car alternatives has translated into a freeze on vehicle miles traveled and tailpipe emissions in the metro area over the past decade, according to data from the Metropolitan Washington Council of Governments (MWCOG).

That’s despite a growing population: The city of Washington has added more than 100,000 people since 2000. Per capita, there’s actually been a regional decrease in transportation-related greenhouse gas emissions.

But to meet the region’s goals, the trend would have to accelerate significantly.

“We’re doing things that are actually making progress,” said Steve Walz, the director of environmental programs for MWCOG. “It’s a wide mixture of things, ranging from more transit oriented development being put in place, people just don’t need to drive as much, fewer younger people owning vehicles, greater numbers of people walking and biking.”

“We just need to grow the scale,” he added.

In D.C., biking advocates and their government allies have made a concerted effort for at least a decade to get more people on two wheels, and it’s starting to show.

About 4.6 percent of residents get around by bike, according to the American Community Survey, making it second place in major metropolitan areas behind Portland, Ore. The share of bike commuters in D.C. has doubled in the past five years — the fastest growth in the top seven cities for bikers, and the only positive growth in the group from 2015 to 2016.

Yet it would be difficult to estimate if the rise in biking, particularly bike-sharing, can further suppress the city’s emissions, said Susan Shaheen, director of the Transportation Sustainability Research Center at the University of California, Berkeley.

“There’s so many factors affecting travel behavior,” she said. “What’s going to be super interesting is whether there are different and new users, different usage patterns emerging, and if that is because it is a more cost-effective strategy in light of the docking stations being a high capital expenditure.”

It’s not just bikes. In the city, a third of residents don’t own a car. Thirty-seven percent use public transit to commute.

But the primary method by which residents commute is still the car. That’s still at 40 percent. Moreover, car and Metro commuters from outside the city nearly double the city’s population every day.

Stewart Schwartz, executive director and a founder of the Coalition for Smarter Growth, calls the low share of D.C. residents who drive to work a “success story” but the regional dependence on cars “frustrating.”

“While individual pieces of transit-oriented development are doing better, there is not enough commitment still to reducing our greenhouse gas emissions to where they need to go to save our many poor from flooding in the future,” said Schwartz.

D.C.’s obstacles are several-fold.

First, the funding shortage plaguing the Metro system and the lack of options in some low-income or far-flung neighborhoods make cheap, affordable access to low-carbon mobility more difficult. One requirement of the dockless bike-share pilot is to have them in all eight wards of the city, but the vast majority are concentrated in downtown.

Second, the bikes have kinks, and people take time to adapt.

CHANGING A CULTURE

The dockless bike-shares litter the sidewalks and parks of the city, raising concerns they limit pedestrian mobility or just look ugly. They’ve appeared at the airport and the suburbs, outside the boundaries for the pilot. Some have ended up in strange places — like the roof of a car, up a tree, in a ditch or on balconies. That has spawned a fad among locals, who post pictures on Prince of Petworth, a local blog.

Some bikes have been vandalized or damaged through robbery attempts, bent frames, broken locks or torn baskets.

Similar concerns arose when Capital Bikeshare launched 10 years ago, said Kim Lucas, the program’s coordinator. But its benefits are real. Capital Bikeshare users have logged 18 million rides on 4,000 bikes. The program is planning to expand with at least 99 new stations.

“We see the new dockless bike-shares as a complement to Capital Bikeshare, and we’re excited about that possibility,” said Lucas. “The more options that we have available, the better cities will function as a transportation network.”

She said the city hopes people will use the bikes to link up with public transit, rather than jumping in a car. One of the new companies is even trying to lure motorists away from their cars by offering a different kind of motor: an electric one. JUMP is targeting users who like speed, or those who need to travel farther.

“The cool thing about bike-share in the past is that people who didn’t consider themselves bikers could use it; now, even more so, this product is going to attract an even wider market, because now they have this electric assist,” said Colin Hughes, director of strategic development at JUMP Mobility. “There is a change happening, and it’s small, but it’s snowballing.”

The dockless bike-share companies are not yet releasing their usage data publicly.

Reprinted from Climatewire with permission from E&E News. E&E provides daily coverage of essential energy and environmental news at www.eenews.net.

23 Photo courtesy of Washington Post/Getty Images

For the first time in years, commuters in the Washington region who ride Metro four days a week outnumber those who ride every weekday — a subtle but significant ridership shift that transit officials fear may have long-term implications for the transit agency.

According to data released Tuesday by Metro’s Office of Planning, there has been a steady decline since 2013 in the average number of monthly trips taken by commuters carrying SmarTrip cards — down from 20 trips per month to 18. And data analysts contend that only about 30 percent of Metro’s recent ridership losses are due to people abandoning the system because of reliability and problems with on-time performance.

Instead, the rise of teleworking may have a more significant impact on ridership, confirming theories raised by transit officials in recent months: Rail ridership during morning peak-period hours on Fridays — a typical teleworking day for the federal government — is usually 15 to 20 percent lower than on days in the middle of the week.

That may play an outsize role in the steady ridership decline that Metro has seen in recent years. And it’s a trend that weighs heavily on Metro General Manager Paul J. Wiedefeld. Metro must improve service and reliability, he said, but teleworking is a threat to the agency’s finances — and something over which it has no control.

“It’s not even four days a week now,” Wiedefeld said at a recent meeting, citing new numbers from the federal government on rates of teleworking. “People are coming in twice and three times a month. I can’t change that. That’s going to be what it is.”

Monitoring how riders use the system — and on what days of the week frequent commuters travel — is a relatively new ability for Metro, made possible by the introduction of SmarTrip cards that allow Metro to monitor individual cards to learn about the frequency and timing of use. Metro officials say they intend to use that data to drill down into details that could explain exactly why ridership is ebbing — and how to stem the decline.

The data also paints a sobering picture of the future of Metro: Though officials continue to hope that improving reliability and rehabbing the system’s infrastructure may help win back some riders, there is a growing acknowledgment that the numbers may never return to the boom-time ridership of the early 2000s, when it increased dramatically year after year.

Ridership growth reached its apex in 2008, when it peaked at 750,000 average weekday boardings. Now it hovers just over 600,000 average weekday rides.

Metro’s continued lackluster ridership numbers signal a fundamental shift for the agency’s data analysts and planners, who for years have relied on a simple theory: If the local economy is improving and the Washington region is growing in population, then Metro ridership will also grow.

But now, analysts indicated in the report, it’s clear that the old formula doesn’t work anymore. Anticipating growth on Metro has become a lot more complicated.

“[Metro] needed to rebuild its capacity to monitor and forecast ridership using new data and methods,” analysts say in the report.

And a decrease in federal transit benefits several years ago may also have resulted in some portion of the federal workforce opting to use modes of commuting other than public transit.

However, staffers were blunt in noting that unexpected delays, service interruptions, peak-period meltdowns, ill-timed train offloadings and SafeTrack maintenance projects are a significant part of the ridership problem.

“We realize that it will take some time to regain the trust and confidence of customers needed to return to the system,” the planning staff wrote in the report.

The report, which will be presented at Thursday’s board meeting, said large-scale efforts might be the best solution for the ridership decline long-term. It recommends, for example, that regional leaders take more proactive steps to encourage ridership, such as investing in the construction of housing developments near Metro stations.

They also push for infrastructure improvements that can help public transit operate more efficiently and attract riders with shorter, faster rides — such as installing bus-only lanes and instituting traffic-signal prioritization for buses, as well as fostering pedestrian-friendly neighborhoods that encourage people to walk to their nearby Metro station rather than drive.

Aimee Custis, deputy director of the Coalition for Smarter Growth, said Metro’s new data suggests that regional leaders are responsible for doing more to help the transit agency regain popularity.

“There are things that must absolutely be fixed in-house at Metro,” Custis said. “But we also must deal with things that are outside of Metro’s control, or we won’t solve this problem.”

Wiedefeld said recently that he remains hopeful that the long-term prospect of development and construction in the region means that boom times may still be to come for Metro. In particular, he said, the completion of the second stage of the Silver Line could bring thousands of new daily riders to the system.

“It will still be a few years before some of that occurs,” Wiedefeld said. “But as they get rid of those car lots and stuff and build 20-to-30-story buildings . . . that will start to drive the numbers up.”

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County leaders and residents in White Flint celebrated a milestone in helping to ensure the safety of pedestrians Wednesday evening.

That’s because new crosswalks, equipped with automatic walk signals, were unveiled during a ribbon cutting ceremony with Montgomery County Executive Ike Leggett, County Council President Roger Berliner, and the county’s Department of Transportation Director, Al Roshdieh, on the intersection of Nicholson Lane and Executive Boulevard.

These new crosswalks are a part of a larger project, the White Flint Sector Plan, which includes improving the safety of pedestrians and cyclists.

“This is a big deal,”  Mark Fitzpatrick, co-owner of Choice Real Estate Group, said. “Me and my family […] we eat here, we do everything in this area so the more you see it changing and improve, it lets us know that they are actually being proactive and care.”

It was the persistence of a grassroots collection of people from Pike Park Pedestrians, with the help of staff from Friends of White Flint and the Coalition of Smarter Growth, that promoted Montgomery County leaders and MCDOT to respond.

Wednesday’s ribbon cutting was just one of dozens of projects MCDOT has planned for the White Flint area.

“This is the first of tangible and physical improvements that are being constructed that we’ve helped work for,” Jay Corbalis, development associate for Federal Realty, said. “It’s more symbolic of the on the ground, safe improvements, we’re making.”