Reston leads the Silver Line way on the first commute.

UPDATE:  A separate Washington Post report indicates that ridership on the western end of the Orange Line--Vienna to West Falls Church stations--was down about 7,000 people in this morning's rush period reflecting a shift of Orange Line users to the Silver Line.  That means the $3 billion investment in Phase 1 of the Silver Line yielded fewer than 3,000 (32%) new passengers to Metrorail.  That does not seem to be a good start. 

As Martin Di Caro explains, Reston's Wiehle Station accounted for more than half of all the morning rush period boardings and alightings at the new Silver Line stations with over 5,700 commuters.

Silver Line Ridership Off To A Strong Start, Especially In Reston

By: Martin Di Caro

The Silver Line saw impressive ridership during its first morning rush hour as thousands of commuters arrived at the Wiehle-Reston East station in Virginia via car, bus and bicycle.

The new station in Reston, with its 2,300-space underground park-and-ride and dozens of bus bays, saw the most riders by far of the five new Silver Line stops in Northern Virginia. The other four are in Tysons Corner—and only one of those has parking. The temporary lot at the McLean station was mostly empty deep into the morning commute.

From 5 to 10 a.m., more than 9,700 commuters either boarded or exited a train at the five Silver Line stations. The most boardings were at Wiehle-Reston East, where 4,727 commuters took trains east during morning rush hour. More than 1,000 commuters exited there.

Here is the ridership for the four Tysons stations with station name followed by the number of boardings/exits as of 10 a.m:

• McLean (568/442)
• Tysons Corner (507/900)
• Spring Hill (559/432)
• Greensboro (185/332) . . . .

Click here for the rest of Di Caro's report. 

We don't know how many of the riders were actually Restonians, how many are new Metro riders (vice Orange Line converts or formerly bussed to West Falls Church/Orange Line), etc.  We hope that WMATA will soon systematically collect this data and make it available so Reston and County officials can make appropriate adjustments to bus transit and other supporting infrastructure needs.