As public transportation ridership in the D.C. region rebounds from the COVID-19 pandemic, local transportation officials are revisiting 2007 plans to construct a second entrance at the Foggy Bottom-GWU Metro station.
The Foggy Bottom-GWU station tallied 25,711 riders on March 29 — the day after cherry blossoms reached peak bloom, surging past prepandemic numbers with the boost of President Donald Trump ordering federal employees return to the office, including buildings in the neighborhood like the U.S. Departments of State and Interior. Washington Metropolitan Area Transportation Authority’s Safety and Operations Committee reviewed a presentation outlining a vision for “world class” transit at a meeting Wednesday that included a second entrance at Foggy Bottom Metro, most likely at the intersection of 22nd and I streets, which Foggy Bottom Association President John George said is “necessary” for “comfort and capacity” in the station.
The Foggy Bottom and West End Advisory Commission in 2015 passed a resolution in support of a second entrance, when the station averaged 22,000 riders weekdays. After winter break, when weekly average ridership dropped to half of last years’, ridership has been about 10 percent higher this far into the year than it was in 2024 on a weekly basis, according to ridership data.
As the cherry blossoms were in an early stage of bloom on March 27, the station saw 20,527 riders — the highest weekday ridership since January 2020. Metro said the bus and rail system counted more than 1 million riders on March 28 for the first time since 2020.
The Foggy Bottom-GWU Metro station currently has no second entrance to relieve crowd pressure inflamed by the station’s solo downward escalator from the mezzanine to the platform on high ridership days, like peak days of cherry blossom season and large demonstrations on the National Mall. Foggy Bottom has jumped to the most popular metro station a total of 190 days since it first did so in 2023, but Metro Center’s and Union Station’s nonstudent riders propel their daily average rider totals above Foggy Bottom when students are home for summer and winter breaks, according to the Metrorail Ridership Summary.
WMATA General Manager Randy Clarke said at a Board of Directors meeting on Thursday that the planning team hopes to share a “business study” that will cover “benefits and costs, capacity analysis, full life cycle analysis” on what improvements to the Blue, Orange and Silver lines corridor and possibly including a second entrance to the Foggy Bottom Metro stop may look like.
“We’re starting the baseball game today,” Clarke said. “First pitch of the game.”
WMATA estimated the price of constructing a second entrance excluding a station canopy at $21.2 million in 2007.
A Metro spokesperson said in an email that their Board of Directors approved “service increases” as part of their 2026 budget that will go into effect at the end of June. The budget includes increasing rail frequencies, modifying bus service patterns and trying to implement automatic train operation — which allows operators to supervise while a central system controls the speed and doors of the train — beyond the Red line, where WMATA initiated the service in December 2024.
The 2026 budget funds earlier weekend openings and later weekend closings, more peak-hour trains on the Silver and Red lines, modifying the Yellow line to serve Greenbelt and Silver line trains split between service to Downtown Largo and New Carrollton.
George said FBA recently formed the Foggy Bottom and West End Main Streets program, a grant program funded by the District, which allows neighborhood nonprofits to distribute funds to improve public improvements and attract businesses, that could support small businesses near a second entrance.
George said a second entrance requires “close collaboration” with the University in their development of a new 20-year campus plan. GW created the current campus plan in 2007 and most recently updated it in 2015 to include Corcoran School of Art & Design students in calculating the student population.
Campus plans in the District govern how land can be used and are approved by the Zoning Commission as Planned Unit Developments, which the Office of Zoning says allow developers to incorporate “public benefits” that could not be “achieved” under regular zoning provisions.
The 2023 study stated Foggy Bottom’s Main Street program is the largest in the District. It also said top concerns among the neighborhood’s business owners were marketing, branding and customer acquisition. Community leaders said the neighborhood needs more coordination and resources to reverse a “long running decline” in retail, particularly in Columbia Plaza and the Watergate, according to the study.
“Collaborative planning with Metro and the Main Street is important as we work with businesses to meet demands of customers,” George said. “Increased ridership means more customers.”
George said Metro should align their plans with community needs, adding that he supports automatic train operation and more bus lanes but questions linger about projects the D.C. Department of Transportation abandoned, like the K Street Transitway. DDOT proposed the transitway in January 2020, and its web page says it is “on hold indefinitely.”
George said FBA has “great” relationships with GW and is a “force” for good in Foggy Bottom.
“We stopped the bulldozing of our neighborhood in the 1950’s amid massive urban renewal,” George said. “We fought to hold onto our greenspaces and public gardens and through community efforts, improved them. ”
Michael Akin, then-assistant vice president of the Office of Government, International and Community Relations, said in a 2010 interview that under the 2007 Foggy Bottom Campus Plan, the University plans to leave an area near the corner of I and 22nd streets vacant.
“The commitments we made under the campus plan [said] future development will not impede the installation of the Metro site,” Akin said in 2010.
The 2007 report found Foggy Bottom-GWU Metro station does not have sufficient capacity to evacuate passengers, failing to meet “industry standards.” The report relied on an estimated 15 percent in ridership growth between the study and 2030 as a foundation for justifying a second entrance.
P2D, a joint venture of Parsons Transportation Group, Parsons Brinckerhoff and Delon Hampton & Associates, wrote the report.
An average of 40,864 passengers used Foggy Bottom-GWU Metro station per day in 2006, according to the report.
