Metro wants to raise fares 11% and make rides free for every kid under 19 in the region

What every Metro rider needs to know before Thursday's board meeting

If you swipe into a Metro station today, you pay somewhere between $2.25 and $6.75 depending on how far you're going. Under a proposal WMATA released Monday morning, that range would climb to $2.50 to $7.50 starting in July 2027, a jump of roughly 11.1% across the board. The Metro Board of Directors sits down Thursday, October 8, to discuss it.

That's the number most riders will notice. But buried a few pages deeper in the same budget documents is a proposal that could rewrite how hundreds of thousands of children across D.C., Maryland, and Virginia get to school, practice, and everywhere else.

The fare hike, in plain terms

Metro is proposing an 11.1% fare increase for FY2028 across Metro Rail, Metro Bus, and Metro Access. The lowest fare for short trips would increase from $2.25 to $2.50, while the maximum fare for longer trips would rise from $6.75 to $7.50. Metrobus and MetroAccess fares would also increase 11% under the proposal.

The fare hike would bring in an expected $40 million to $45 million more in revenue, while causing riders to take 8 million fewer trips, according to board documents. That last figure is not a rounding error. Eight million trips is roughly 22,000 rides a day that WMATA itself projects will simply disappear if fares go up. The agency is betting the revenue gain outweighs the ridership loss. Whether that bet holds in a city where transit use is still climbing back from the pandemic is a genuinely open question.

The last time WMATA raised the fare was in 2024, increasing the price by 12.5%. Two increases in three years, each around 11 to 13 percent, adds up fast for daily commuters. A rider taking the longest rail trip twice a day, five days a week, would pay roughly $750 more per year under the new schedule.

Off-peak fares get complicated. Currently, Metro charges a reduced fare of between $2.25 and $2.50 on weekends and after 9:30 p.m. on weekdays. The documents released Monday show Metro is proposing raising that to between $2.50 and $2.80. However, Metro also is floating several other ideas to the board that would either continue to limit those fares to no more than $2.50, or increase them to more than $2.80. In other words, even the off-peak numbers aren't locked in yet.

There's one more piece to the payment side: the proposal also outlines a framework to eliminate cash payments for bus travel in an effort to modernize the payment system. That detail got almost no attention in Monday's coverage, but it has real consequences for the city's lowest-income riders who rely on cash at the farebox.

The youth program that could actually be bigger news

Paired with the fare increase is something almost the opposite. The transit agency also says a proposed initiative would provide free access on Metro Rail and Metro Bus for all children ages 5 through 18 who live in Washington, D.C., Maryland, or Virginia. This program carries an estimated net cost of $7 million and is projected to add 900,000 trips.

For D.C. residents the nuance matters. The proposal would primarily benefit young people in Maryland and Virginia, because DC already has a 'Kids Ride Free' program for most youth. D.C.'s existing program, administered through schools, covers students ages 5 to 21 enrolled in public, charter, private, or parochial schools located within the District. The new WMATA proposal would be regional and automatic, not school-linked, which is a meaningful difference in access.

The change would cost Maryland taxpayers an estimated $3.5 million extra in subsidies, and Virginia taxpayers would have to pay the same amount. Whether Maryland and Virginia jurisdictions actually sign on is far from settled. Expanding a program that costs the District relatively little while asking Fairfax and Montgomery counties to write checks is a harder political sell in Annapolis and Richmond than it looks from the WMATA boardroom.

Timeline: nothing is final yet, but decisions are coming fast

The Metro Board of Directors will discuss the proposals on October 8, 2026, ahead of the General Manager's proposed budget release in December 2026 and public hearings planned for winter 2027 before final budget adoption in spring 2027. The committee will not take any action on the proposal on Thursday. WMATA officials recommend the Metro Board of Directors schedule a public hearing to collect feedback before implementing the changes.

That process sounds deliberate, but the calendar is tight. If fares are supposed to change in July 2027, the board needs to approve a budget in spring 2027. Public hearings in winter typically run six to eight weeks. That leaves maybe a two-month window, starting in December, for public comment to actually move the needle. Riders who want to weigh in have a short runway.

What Lewis George's transit pitch adds to this moment

The WMATA announcement landed on the same day the presumptive next mayor published her most detailed transit comments yet. Ward 4 Councilmember Janeese Lewis George rode the D44 bus from Petworth to downtown to discuss her plans for transit as mayor. Her pledge is that she'll 'empower' her DDOT director to 'unstick stuck projects.'

Ironically enough, that's a catchphrase that's been deployed many times over the years by Lewis George's predecessor, Mayor Muriel Bowser, though the current executive generally uses that mantra to refer to major development deals, not bus lanes. Indeed, Bowser has frequently attracted the ire of the urbanist set by hemming and hawing on such projects or folding in the face of neighborhood opposition and budget concerns.

Lewis George has not yet said publicly how she would respond to an 11.1% fare hike landing on D.C. riders in her first year in office. The 2026 Washington, D.C., mayoral election will be held on November 3, 2026. She would take office with the WMATA budget process already deep into public hearings. Her DDOT director pick, whoever it is, will have to navigate both the fare debate and the stuck bus-lane projects she mentioned Monday, at the same time.

Ward 4 Councilmember Janeese Lewis George says her young son, Pierce, lights up and points whenever he sees a Metrobus approaching. The District's presumptive next mayor is similarly enthusiastic when it comes to bus travel. Whether that enthusiasm translates into pressure on the WMATA board, or a concrete commitment to hold fares down through D.C.'s subsidy contribution, is something she hasn't spelled out. Her campaign has 29 days left to do it.

The D.C. government's lever on this

WMATA is a regional compact, not a D.C. city agency. The mayor and council can't simply block a fare increase. But D.C. is WMATA's largest single funding source. The District's annual subsidy contribution gives local elected officials real leverage at the board table, and D.C. appoints four of the board's eight voting members. If the mayor's office wanted to signal opposition, Thursday's meeting is the moment to do it.

The Council has been quiet so far. No statement from Chairman Phil Mendelson's office had appeared by Monday afternoon. Ward 6 Councilmember Charles Allen, who chairs the Committee on Transportation and the Environment, has not commented publicly on the proposal as of publication time.

In 2025, the system had a ridership of 307,298,900, or about 889,900 per weekday as of the first quarter of 2026. Those are the riders who would absorb the increase, and they vote in D.C., Maryland, and Virginia in a matter of weeks.

What D.C. Residents Should Watch

• October 8 WMATA Board meeting: The Metro Board of Directors will discuss the proposals on October 8, 2026. Listen for whether D.C.'s four board members signal support or opposition to the 11.1% figure, and whether anyone asks about the cash-payment elimination plan for buses.
• The youth free-ride regional negotiation: Maryland and Virginia would each need to cover an estimated $3.5 million in new subsidies. Watch for statements from Montgomery County and Fairfax County officials, whose buy-in is required for a regional program to work.
• Lewis George's WMATA position: With 29 days until Election Day, November 3, the Democratic nominee still hasn't staked out a clear stance on the fare proposal. Any mayoral debate or campaign stop this week could force the question.
• D.C. Council response: Councilmember Charles Allen's transportation committee and Chairman Mendelson's office have not responded publicly as of Monday. A joint letter to WMATA's general manager or board chair would be the traditional move; its absence would be notable.
• Public hearing schedule: Once the board formally schedules hearings, D.C. residents will have their only direct input window. The WMATA website at wmata.com will post dates; past hearings have filled quickly.

The current off-peak weekend rail fare of $2.25, the entry point for many lower-income commuters who time their trips to save money, would go to at least $2.50 under every version of the proposal on the table Thursday.

Sources:
FOX 5 DC — Metro proposes fare increase, free access for DMV youth (Oct. 5, 2026)
The Washington Post — Metro proposes fare increases for rail and bus riders (Oct. 5, 2026)
WJLA (7News) — Proposed Metrorail hike would raise fares as high as $7.50 (Oct. 5, 2026)
The Washington Sun — WMATA Proposes Inflation-Based Metro Fare Increase (Oct. 5, 2026)
The 51st — Lewis George says she won't let the 'loudest person' hold up transit projects (Oct. 5, 2026)
WMATA — Kids Ride Free program details