This bus runs from the Braddock Road metro station to the Crystal City metro station. These two stations are on the same metro lines, and are about 8 minutes apart by metro.
So you may ask yourself: why is this bus necessary, if it connects two places that are only 8 minutes apart by metro? The answer is because it stops at places the metro does not, most importantly the Potomac Yards area. Potomac Yards is home to two separate developments: a massive strip mall anchored by a Target, a Shoppers, a Best Buy, and a Barnes and Noble (with many other stores and restaurants and a movie theater, and a massive residential development home to tons of recently built townhomes and apartment complexes.
Currently, this Metroway bus is the only public transit that connects Potomac Yards to the outside world. As somebody who lives in Old Town Alexandria, I like to take this bus back from my shopping trips, so I don't have to walk with all the crap I bought.
But sometime later this decade, they are going to open a metro stop at Potomac Yard. Then, what purpose will this bus line serve? That is a question that regional transit planners will need to answer.
Oh yeah - while this bus is running on US Route 1 (the Jefferson Davis highway), it runs in the middle on a dedicated lane that is bus-only. That is cool, and a first for the region, but it only runs in that dedicated lane for a portion of its route. Also, in part because of the cost of building those lanes, this bus is more expensive than a typical metro bus.
For now, this is a cool bus that suffers from having a very limited mission. Three stars. read more