🚀 go-pugleaf

>: pressed (and they can even be TOO new!).  The machines will eat your 
>: money, and not give you a card.  And, often times, many machines are not 
>: working at all.
>
>       I agree with you, but I think you missed the most important advantage
>we have in NYC :P  $1.50, and you can ride the trains anywhere, anytime, for
>any distance.  Those $3 one-way trips on the DC metro didn't endear me to the
>city :P

Now wait a minute...expensive as the DC subway system may be, I personally think it's worth it.  It's much cleaner than NYC's, runs =
at a much more manageable pace, most of the street urchins are kept out and my experience with the station employees has been much m=
ore positive than those of the NYC system.  I hear DC subway employees are among the highest paid transit employees in the country, =
but I think we get what we pay for.  There is one major reason for last summer's increase in fares on the DC system and this was due=
 to Virginia state governer Allen's decision to lower the requirement for driving HOV carpool lane on the Beltway to a minimum of 2 =
persons in the car instead of 3.  As a result, ridership on the DC subway declined about 1% overall and 4% on the orange line (where=
 the DC subway is essentially competing with the Beltway for commuter traffic).  Thus, riders like me have to make up the difference=
 in lost revenue for the subway system.  Thank you, governer Allen! Thank God they can't re-elect him, I really despise that S.O.B. =
and the move he made with the HOV carpool lane last summer was the straw that broke the camel's back.  That is all.

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"We're just two lost souls swimming in a fish bowl, year after year..."
			-Pink Floyd