Washington, DC’s public transportation network is a regional system rather than a District-only operation. In 2024, the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority (WMATA) reported 262,474,117 annual unlinked passenger trips, while its FY2024 financial report counted 242.1 million trips across Metrorail, Metrobus, and MetroAccess under its stated counting methods. The figures below describe the network’s scale, use, service supply, reliability, accessibility, safety, and customer experience.
Contents
- System scale and geographic reach
- Ridership by mode
- Service supplied and fleet capacity
- Mode productivity and coverage
- Reliability and accessibility
- Safety, crowding, and customer experience
System scale and geographic reach
The 2024 National Transit Database (NTD) agency profile places WMATA’s primary urbanized area at 1,295 square miles, with a population of 5,174,759. WMATA reported a service-area population of 4,645,915 and a service area covering 1,108 square miles in the 2024 report year. These are regional measures: the NTD profile says the service area includes the Washington-Arlington, DC-VA-MD urbanized area and other areas served, so they should not be read as District-of-Columbia-only boundaries. (2024 Annual Agency Profile - Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority (NTD ID 30030))
WMATA’s network recorded 371.16 track miles in the 2024 asset profile. Across all modes, the agency reported 262,474,117 annual unlinked passenger trips. Its average weekday total was 830,643 unlinked passenger trips, compared with 549,625 on an average Saturday and 401,775 on an average Sunday. The weekday figure was therefore more than twice the reported Sunday average, illustrating how strongly commuting and weekday travel shape the system’s typical daily demand without requiring an estimate of annual weekday totals.
The NTD figures use unlinked passenger trips, meaning a boarding is counted for each vehicle or mode used. They are therefore a system-usage measure, not a count of unique people or complete door-to-door journeys. The fiscal-year ridership figures below use the definitions described in WMATA’s financial report and are kept separate from the NTD report-year totals.
Ridership by mode
WMATA’s FY2024 financial report counted 242.1 million trips across Metrorail, Metrobus, and MetroAccess. Metrorail recorded 123.2 million trips when tapped and non-tapped riders were included. Metrobus recorded 117.5 million trips using automated passenger counts, while MetroAccess recorded 1.4 million trips. (Financial Progress Report Fiscal Year 2024 Quarter 4)
The same report describes substantial year-over-year growth in both core modes. FY2024 Metrorail ridership was 29% higher than FY2023, an increase of 27.4 million trips, and it finished 5.7% above the budgeted total in WMATA’s Q4 report. Metrobus ridership increased by 15 million trips from FY2023 to FY2024, or 15%.
| Mode | FY2024 trips | Counting detail or comparison |
|---|---|---|
| Metrorail | 123.2 million | Tapped and non-tapped riders included; 29% above FY2023 |
| Metrobus | 117.5 million | Automated passenger counts; 15% above FY2023 |
| MetroAccess | 1.4 million | Paratransit trips reported for FY2024 |
| All three modes | 242.1 million | FY2024 financial-report total |
The mode totals should not be combined with the NTD annual total as though they used identical definitions. WMATA’s notes state that the financial-report rail total includes tapped and non-tapped riders, while the bus total uses automated passenger counts and includes rail-work shuttles. FY2024 refers to the agencies’ fiscal-year reporting period; the NTD profile uses annual 2024 report-year measures.
Service supplied and fleet capacity
WMATA reported 1,150,610,949 annual passenger miles traveled in 2024. It supplied 156,173,210 annual vehicle or passenger-car revenue miles and 9,748,485 annual vehicle or passenger-car revenue hours. The agency operated 2,774 vehicles in maximum service and listed 3,489 vehicles available for maximum service. These measures describe supplied service and available resources, not a prediction of how many vehicles a rider will see on a particular trip. (2024 Annual Agency Profile - Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority (NTD ID 30030))
Heavy rail accounted for 795,207,355 passenger miles traveled, while bus service accounted for 339,331,979. On the supply side, heavy rail provided 98,625,151 vehicle revenue miles and bus provided 38,580,473 vehicle revenue miles. The two mode groupings therefore show different service profiles: rail supplied the larger reported totals for both passenger miles and vehicle revenue miles, while bus still represented a substantial share of regional travel and service.
The passenger-mile totals measure passenger movement across the network, whereas vehicle revenue miles measure vehicle service. They should not be interpreted as average trip length unless the relevant passenger and boarding definitions are aligned. Keeping those units separate is important when comparing the scale of rail and bus operations.
Mode productivity and coverage
The NTD profile recorded 143,537,550 annual unlinked passenger trips on heavy rail, 117,539,605 on bus, and 1,396,962 on demand-response service in 2024. Demand-response service is the category associated with the agency’s accessible transportation operation in these profile measures. (2024 Annual Agency Profile - Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority (NTD ID 30030))
Heavy rail had 256.20 fixed-guideway directional route miles, compared with 3.40 for bus. The profile also reports 371.16 total track miles, a different measure from directional route miles. Track miles describe infrastructure, while directional route miles describe route coverage by direction; the two figures are not interchangeable.
WMATA reported 1.7 total unlinked passenger trips per vehicle revenue mile and 26.9 unlinked passenger trips per vehicle revenue hour. By mode, heavy rail produced 1.5 unlinked passenger trips per vehicle revenue mile and bus produced 3.0. These are reported productivity measures, not forecasts. They also do not establish that a typical rail or bus passenger makes a particular number of boardings, because unlinked trips count boardings rather than unique riders.
| 2024 NTD measure | WMATA total | Mode detail reported |
|---|---|---|
| Unlinked passenger trips per vehicle revenue mile | 1.7 | Heavy rail 1.5; bus 3.0 |
| Unlinked passenger trips per vehicle revenue hour | 26.9 | Total reported |
| Fixed-guideway directional route miles | — | Heavy rail 256.20; bus 3.40 |
Reliability and accessibility
In FY2024, Metrorail on-time performance was 87.3%, while Metrobus on-time performance was 76.4%. WMATA also reported that Metrorail delivered 98.8% of scheduled trips and Metrobus delivered 98.3% of scheduled service. The distinction matters: on-time performance describes schedule adherence, while delivered service describes whether scheduled trips or service were provided. (Service Excellence Report Summary | FY24 Q1-Q4)
Metrorail missed 6,000 of 544,000 scheduled trips in FY2024, according to WMATA’s service report. MetroAccess on-time pickup performance was 91.3%. Ridership across dedicated service, non-dedicated service, and Abilities-Ride increased 13% from FY2023 to FY2024.
Accessibility infrastructure also had a reported availability measure. Rail-system elevator availability averaged 98.2% in FY2024, with WMATA reporting 314 of 320 rail-system elevators in service at any time. The figure is an availability average and does not mean every station had every elevator available throughout the fiscal year.
Safety, crowding, and customer experience
Passengers spent 0.7% of passenger minutes in crowded rail conditions above 100 passengers per car in FY2024. This is a passenger-time measure for the rail system, not a count of trains or stations that reached that level and not a personal-risk estimate.
WMATA reported customer injury rates of 16.5 injuries per 10 million revenue miles for rail, 63.3 for bus, and 10.5 for MetroAccess. Customer and employee assaults totaled 9.2 per 10 million revenue miles. The agency also reported 6.6 Part 1 crime incidents per 1 million customers. WMATA’s notes specify that injury and assault rates use revenue-mile denominators; they should not be presented as the probability that an individual passenger will be injured or assaulted. (Service Excellence Report Summary | FY24 Q1-Q4)
Customer experience measures provide a different perspective from operational rates. Rail customers’ satisfaction with train cleanliness was 68% in FY2024. Bus customers’ satisfaction with bus cleanliness was 62% in FY2024 Q4, so the two percentages do not cover exactly the same reporting period. The rail employee injury rate was 3.1 injuries per 10 million revenue miles in FY2024.
Taken together, these measures show a large regional system with hundreds of millions of reported annual boardings, substantial rail and bus service supply, improving FY2024 ridership, and separate strengths and constraints in punctuality, elevator availability, crowding, safety rates, and cleanliness satisfaction. Each result remains tied to its stated fiscal or report year and to WMATA’s published definitions.