When D.C.’s Metro opened on March 27, 1976, it didn’t go very far. Five stops, all downtown. It grew quickly after that, spiderweb-like. D.C.’s suburbs started metastasizing. In the ensuing decades, Metro became somehow indispensable — critical infrastructure. Its facilities’ brutalist architecture, its charmless cars with their weird electric noises, even its incomprehensible fare machines gave Metro a rep. It became a tourist attraction.

Riders developed a love-hate for Metro. Like Longfellow’s little girl, when Metro’s good it’s very, very good and when it’s bad it’s horrid.

Lately it’s been mostly horrid.

And, predictably, the whole thing has become a federal affair.

Metro hasn’t quite gone into receivership. But The Transportation Department’s Federal Transit Administration took over safety oversight back in October.

And now, Metro — to a collective gasp in the region — has launched a crash program (no pun intended) to rehabilitate its tracks. The service disruptions and their potential to delay federal employees from getting to work prodded the Office of Personnel Management into action. Well, “action” in the sense that OPM will establish an interagency working group to assess what might happen and develop “continuity” options.

Besides telework, online meeting services and flexible schedule, what options do they have? Biking, rowing the Potomac River and using Uber every day are options only available to a few fitness nuts and those with lots of extra cash. I used to work next door to Union Station and would occasionally ride a bike to work 22 miles each way from Rockville. It’s was fun, and at times downright scary, but not practical to do daily, trust me.

For errands between between federal offices or at lunchtime, you’ve always got those dorky Capital Bikeshare bikes. No fun, though, going to a meeting with your blue button-down all sweaty.

The fires, crashes, running over track workers — all the large and small disasters had the effect of blowing the proverbial rock off Metro. Underneath, it was crawling with problems. Metro’s been mismanaged almost from the day it opened.  And not just financially, but also operationally. Passengers and Metro employees have been killed.

With the federal government pressuring it, Metro can fix its tracks. But can it fix the management culture that’s brought Metro to this point in the first place?

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