The first bus rapid transit line in the DC region will officially begin service on August 24.

The “Metroway” route will run from Crystal City to Braddock Road, partly in mixed traffic and partly in a dedicated transitway. A later phase to open in 2015 will extend the route to Pentagon City, and shift more of it into dedicated lanes.

Route 1 Transitway under construction in Alexandria. Photo from Alexandria.

Metroway is a joint project between Alexandria, Arlington, and WMATA. Alexandria and Arlington are building the transitway in two phases, and WMATA will operate the buses.

For now, only the Alexandria phase is ready. Arlington’s phase just began construction and should be finished next year.

But rather than wait until 2015 to start service, WMATA will begin running buses in August, and simply run in mixed traffic through Crystal City until Arlington’s phase is complete.

Metroway initial route (left) and route starting in 2015 (right). Image from WMATA.

Metroway will run every 6 minutes at peak times, dropping to every 12 minutes at midday, and every 20 minutes on weekends.

Arlington will eventually convert its portion of the route to streetcar.

 Cross-posted at Greater Greater Washington.