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Las Vegas police Monday outlined a handful of missteps, including miscommunication from the U.S. Marshals Office, that led up to the moment two Metro officers shot and killed an unarmed fugitive holding a cell phone in front of a west valley home on New Year's Eve. Eighteen minutes before the shooting, Metro knew nothing about the fugitive, Keith Childress. Though the agency often works with U.S. Marshals to catch fugitives, Metro had its eye on the Strip that afternoon, where about 1,000 officers were working with the Nevada National Guard to secure the area for celebrations, Undersheriff Kevin McMahill said....

Megan Barry has been elected mayor in Nashville’s runoff election. Barry called the night historic. “This one is going down in the history books,” she said. “This one is all about the fact that today, you went to the polls and you elected the first woman mayor.” As Barry’s victory speech went on, the crowd began chanting her name. “Tomorrow our real work begins,” she said.

Jasper Spires boarded the Red Line Metro train at Rhode Island Avenue shortly before 1 p.m. Saturday, joining passengers from the District and elsewhere headed to various Fourth of July festivities, among them the Foo Fighters concert at RFK Stadium. As the train rumbled toward its next stop, at NoMa-Gallaudet, a three-minute ride, D.C. police said, the 18-year-old Spires — who may have been high on synthetic drugs — tried to grab a cellphone tucked into the waistband of a recent American University graduate headed to a gathering with friends. The two struggled, police said, and the terror began.

Though many public transit systems across the U.S. have increased fares in recent years, chances are your local transit system still isn’t breaking even on your ride: According to a Hamilton Project (THP) post, of the more than 1,800 mass transit systems in the United States—including those running trains, buses, or other transport modes—only about two percent reported that fare revenue exceeded operating expenses in 2013. And when it comes to metro rail systems across the U.S.—which include heavy rail, such as subways and elevated trains, and light rail, which operates at street level—all U.S. systems reported operating at a...

Since 2008, Congress has annually appropriated $150 million for Metro's capital improvement budget under the Passenger Rail Investment and Improvement Act. The District, Maryland, and Virginia have matched that, contributing $50 million each. The proposed GOP legislation would mean Metro would start its fiscal year in July with just $75 million in federal money. Lawmakers who represent House districts in the Washington metropolitan area criticized the spending bill when it was unveiled last month. "It really feels like a betrayal of trust," Democratic Rep. Don Beyer of Virginia said then. "It also is a failure to recognize that Metro is...

The fatal shooting of a man by police along Metrorail tracks in the District Thursday night disrupted service for the Orange, Blue and Silver lines. The Potomac Avenue station in Southeast D.C. was also shut down as firefighters removed the body from the tracks about 400 feet east of the station, inside the tunnel.

The National Transportation Safety Board sent Metro three urgent recommendations Wednesday regarding the ventilation of tunnels in response to the fatal smoke incident Jan. 12 in Washington, D.C. In a letter to interim General Manager Jack Requa, NTSB said Metro should assess its ventilation system, write a procedure for tunnel ventilation and establish ongoing ventilation training for control center staff and emergency responders. "Procedures for ventilation of smoke in emergencies can be critical, but they vary across systems, and in some systems are inadequate — as we have found in the present WMATA investigation,” acting NTSB Chairman Christopher Hart said...

The L'Enfant Plaza Metro station has been evacuated due to smoke in the station. Metro says trains are bypassing the station and the station has been temporarily closed. Metro says the source of the smoke has not been determined and it has activated tunnel fans to ventilate the area.

The L'Enfant Plaza Metro station has been evacuated due to smoke in the station. Metro says trains are bypassing the station and the station has been temporarily closed. Metro says the source of the smoke has not been determined and it has activated tunnel fans to ventilate the area.

It turns out I underestimated Metro bureaucrats’ capacity for folly. Two weeks ago, I wrote that the transit system would look silly if it let perish 1,000 flowers planted secretly at the Dupont Circle station by local garden artist Henry Docter, the self-described Phantom Planter. I feared that Metro would merely neglect the flowers. Instead, last Sunday, it sent workmen to yank them out.

A blown transformer at the Van Ness Muni Station in San Francisco caused the shutdown of the Metro subway system Monday evening. Muni officials said the transformer blew at about 6 p.m. as a result of rain damage from Sunday's storm. Subway service had not reopened late Monday, but light-rail vehicles were running on surface lines in the western part of the city. Also, cars on the F-Market line, which runs above ground, had been turned around at 11th Street for a time because of an earlier accident at Market and Dolores streets. The line was reopened at 8:35 p.m....

MARSEILLE, France (JTA) -- A Jewish man was attacked and rendered unconscious in a Paris metro, a local watchdog reported. The 52-year-old victim entered the subway directly from his synagogue but wore no markings that would identify him as Jewish, according to a report on the late September incident by the National Bureau of Vigilance Against Anti-Semitism, or BNVCA, a nonprofit watchdog organization. The incident occurred on the eve of Rosh Hashanah. He may have been targeted because of a Jewish philosophy book by the chief rabbi of Paris that he was reading in the metro when he was attacked,...

At least five people were injured at the L'Enfant Plaza metro station during the Tuesday morning rush hour due to a malfunction on an escalator, officials say. D.C. Fire officials say that three people were taken to area hospitals for treatment after the accident, which happened just after 8:30 a.m. The other two injured people were treated at the station. Metro spokesperson Cathy Asato says that they believe a bag or piece of clothing belonging to a customer caught a side panel of an escalator, detaching it and causing some people to lose their balance. Several pictures and reports on...

High temperatures caused a “heat kink” along a stretch of Metrorail track, officials said, closing a portion of Green Line service throughout the weekend and likely impacting the Monday morning rush hour. Service between Fort Totten and Prince George’s Plaza was suspended Saturday and Sunday while crews repaired the 1,000-foot section of track bent out of shape because of the hot weather. Metro officials announced Sunday night that service had restarted between the two stations, but trains were single-tracking.

Metro officials on Saturday said excessive heat was the probable cause for a train derailment Friday in Prince George’s County. Investigators said a “heat kink” due to extreme high temperatures and direct exposure to sunlight likely caused the rails to expand, resulting in the derailment. The derailment was reported on the inbound stretch of the Green Line near the West Hyattsville Station around 4:45 p.m.

<p>Triple-digit temperatures expected to feel as hot as 110 degrees have prompted excessive heat warnings across the D.C. area on Saturday and could threaten all-time highs.</p> <p>The day continued a trend in the area that hasn’t seen high temperatures lower than 95 degrees since the month began.</p>

Metro proposes to increase bus and rail fares by about 5 percent, raise parking rates and eliminate a controversial rush-hour surcharge this summer to overcome a $116 million shortfall in its next operating budget. Riders who use paper Farecards would face the biggest change. Whether going two stops or 10, they would pay one-way flat fares: $6 during rush hour, $4 in off-peak times. For a group traveling together, hailing a taxi might quickly become more palatable. (snip) Metro officials, however, are promoting the simplification of fares as a plus. The new fare structure would eliminate the “peak-of-the-peak” rate, in which...

“Pointless … like giving caviar to an elephant.” ~ William Faulkner Leave it to Faulkner to create a simile so apt that it reaches across decades to apply, very neatly, to the futility of foisting Mitt Romney upon the Republican Party as its presidential nominee. The image of the elephant is self-evidently appropriate. As for caviar, despite its association with money and privilege, one wonders who actually enjoys its taste. Truth be told, it is over-rated, as most delicacies are. Caviar is a lot like Marmite, only more expensive and lacking its nutritional value. So it is with Romney, moneyed...

For anyone in the DC area who relies on metrorail, a wheel fell off one of the trains on the Orange Line this morning and the entire system is snarled, with people still stuck on the train. Those who made it off are reporting that Metro still made them pay exit fare and somehow find their own alternative transportation.

Here is a series of videos from Metro showing the truck-train accident Tuesday morning (Related news article and photos).