Live Q&As

You can find tips on what routes to avoid and which ones to take here.

We've also got some suggestions in our summer getaway guide.

If possible, leave after 8 p.m. on Friday. (Or around noon, if you have that kind of flexibility.) Sunday morning should be fine for a return, but consider that we're not talking Thanksgiving traffic here.

Basically, on getaways from the DC area, there's Thanksgiving and then there's everything else. July 4 weekend has not traditionally been a horrible one for getaways and getbacks.

I'm glad we have Next Bus. But: Many travelers have weird experiences with it. I've long referred to your scenario as "the ghost bus." Metro has never been able to get this service to the point where it's completely reliable.

As I understand it, the information you see on your mobile device is a combination of the bus locator equipment and a central computer's calculation of where the buses should be given the schedule and current traffic conditions.

The thing gets more accurate -- usually -- the closer it gets to your stop. Yet riders routinely tell me about their experiences with ghost buses.

For complaints, I'd try the Virginia Megaprojects office at this number: 877-959-5222 or e-mail to:

info@VAmegaprojects.com

I know that VDOT has received many complaints about this, and they're along the lines of what you described. I've seen the congestion also, and have written about it in several columns.

So the project officials know what you're talking about. Whether that can translate into a solution, well, I'm less sure of that. The construction on this part of the HOT lanes project is scheduled to continue into 2012.

I've also seen an increase in eating and drinking on the trains. By the end of a rush hour -- especially the afternoon rush -- the cars look pretty crummy.

I'm not sure what the solution is. There are signs and an ad campaign. Transit police say they enforce the rules when they see violations -- they don't like to make arrests for this, but will tell people what they're doing wrong.

Seems like people should take responsibility for themselves on the eating and drinking rules, and they should take their newspapers with them, too.

I was in the southbound lanes about 3:30 p.m. yesterday, and was in stop and go traffic for about five miles, so I was dismayed when I saw the highway-speed lanes were open when I reached the toll plaza.

But DelDot tells me the southbound highway-speed lanes were opened about 2:30 p.m. I may just have been in a residual backup.

At the time, I saw the northbound lanes were open, too.

The project isn't done, and DelDot can still close off those new lanes periodically. It's not 100 percent certain they'll be open this weekend, but DelDOT is very hopeful.

I don't have a report specifically about Woodley Park. But at many of the older stations, the cooling equipment is really old.  It doesn't work as well as it used to, and breaks down more often.

The Red Line is undergoing a lengthy rehab now -- lengthy, as in a few years.

I'll ask if there's a particular problem at Woodley Park.

I know that those mistakes happen, even though the violations are supposed to be reviewed by law enforcement. I'd send them another letter, registered mail, return receipt requested, saying you don't own the and never have owned the vehicle in question or had those plates.

This shouldn't have gotten this far. It should have beend dropped after your first letter.

Dumb as well as cruel. I've -- fortunately -- not heard of anything like this on or roads, so I'm a little unsure what to recommend, but I think I'd start by calling the non-emergency number for the Fairfax County police: 703-691-2131

Shout out to you for stopping and helping.

You are not deceived...reconstruction on the bridge is wrapping up.

I always like to hear from travelers who experience other transportation systems, because it can raise our consciousness about what's good and bad here. I do wonder if our opinion of some of these other systems would drop as we became more familiar with them.

Just a couple of thoughts about your comparisons:

I doubt we'll ever go to the flat fare. The old systems use flat fares for various reasons, but one of them is that they're old. They didn't have the technology to vary fares by time and distance.

Lots of people like such systems. See Sam Staley's op/ed in Sunday's Post about how we should think more seriously about market pricing for transit. (Basing fares on supply and demand.)

But practically speaking, we won't go to a flat fare because it will launch a city vs. suburbs fight.

We need better maps in the stations, like the ones you describe.

There's no deadlilne still for returning the trains to automatic control.

You should not encounter any active projects along the way. Delaware, for example, won't be doing any scheduled construction work at the I-95 toll plaza this holiday weekend.

But they don't pull up the concrete barriers or remove the lane shifts. For example, if you use the NJ Turnpike on the RI trip, you'll find that lengthy zone of lane shifts and no shoulders where New Jersey is widening the turnpike.

Then there's always the beach traffic in Connecticut. Even leaving at 3 a.m., you could encounter that by the time you reach New England.

Yes, and same logic: July 4 weekend is huge for bringing crowds into Washington on transit. So no single-tracking is scheduled for this weekend.

This is true despite Metro's more aggressive approach to weekend maintenance this year.

Many readers know I'm very conservative in giving travel time estimates when people tell me they have appointments. I'd leave an hour and a half for the trip on this holiday getaway weekend.

You may well get there before 6:30 if you follow my plan. But there's likely to be a lot of volume. You'll probably take the Beltway outer loop and pass through the work zone at the Northwest Branch bridge in Silver Spring.

There could be an accident anywhere along the way to slow traffic significantly.

I do think these new lanes will make things a lot easier for all travelers, whether or not they have E-ZPasses. But a couple of cautions:

DelDOT is still finishing up the lanes, and it's possible travelers will find them closed for various reasons at the time they reach them this week.

Long term, if we're talking Thanksgiving Wednesday style traffic, you may still be in slow traffic till you reach the point near the toll plaza where traffic splits for the booths on the right and the highway-speed E-ZPass lanes on the left.

Yes, I think Metro has come to that conclusion also and will have automated announcements on the next generation of rail cars, the 7000 Series.

I believe this will help. Follow the instructions and you should be able to find the bus company you are looking for.

You're reacting to Metro's recent announcement that it's going to move away from weekend single-tracking and toward station closings. That will limit the disrupted part of the line -- maybe.

No schedule for this has been announced yet. As soon as it is, we'll have that for you.

Trying to talk you down: It won't be every weekend. And I think Metro is doing this because it now has a lot of practice setting up and operating the weekend bus bridges.

Example: I was worried about the shuttle bus set up for Memorial Day weekend on the Blue and Orange lines. But that seems to have gone very well.

I think most of the nation's transit systems are two-track systems. In other words, the NYC pattern of having three tracks -- an express track in the middle -- is the rarity. Metro planners didn't do anything weird by going for a two-track system and saving money and disruption. But we clearly see the consequences of that, not only in the weekend delays, but also in the rush hour delays when we have door problems and sick passengers.

I asked Metro's Dave Kubicek about that a couple of months ago. That turned out to be a pretty big project, though I'm still amazed it's been over a year now.

It's not just a question of replacing some ceiling tiles. It turned out to involve designing and building a support column in that space where the wooden construction box is. Still got a ways to go, as I recall.

Yes, I'll bet they'd love to have Metro in Phoenix. At least, till the air conditioners break down.

We've talked during the chat about the July 4 getaway. But we've also got many thousands of people coming to DC for the holiday celebration. Please be patient with them. They don't know how the train doors work. They don't know we stand to the right. They move more slowly than regular commuters.

This seems to be a question people all over the country ask. Not sure there will ever be a definitive answer.

As for D.C., the gas price issue is one that is having a major impact for the Fourth of July weekend. Check out this story on PostLocal. It seems like a lot of people are skipping the drive and choosing air travel.

I suppose that's one way to get around the issue...

It was my understanding that the repairs going on this summer at five bridges along the Anacostia Freeway involve work on all the lanes. But the program will continue through the summer and will continue to affect commuters.

It's not unusual for a bridge repair project to take longer than the original estimate. They often find things they didn't expect to find, or get slowed down by weather, especially toward the end of a project when they do paving and stripping.

The National Park Service project on the Humpback Bridge on the GW Parkway is more than a year behind schedule. The District's 14th Street Bridge project, the work on the northbound span, also is way late from the original estimate.

When I look at the project maps, that area looks to me like a work zone for one of the new ramps that will be part of the HOT lanes set up. That makes me think this isn't just a question of restoring the left lane to the way it was until recently.

I agree that VDOT has to do something to alleviate this congestion. Summertime traffic declines should help, but this road work is going to continue into 2012.

I think you and everybody else should do what works best. (Watch those DC parking meters, though, because of the Saturday hours.)

Metro officials know this weekend work is a big inconvenience to riders. But they say this work needs to be done and done soon.

There is no short-term solution. I'm hopeful that the rebuilding of the Toll Road and I-66 interchanges at the Beltway as part of the HOT lanes project will help. That's about a year and a half away. I'm hopeful that the Dulles Metrorail line will offer a transit alternative that will ease traffic on the toll road and Route 7. VDOT is studying what to do about I-66 -- longterm.

I think you should be fine on Sunday, in the middle of the three-day weekend. (Should be hot and humid, though.)

Sounds like you were riding in one of a handful of rail cars that Metro set up specially to test flooring and seating styles. Those are 6000 Series rail cars. They're the newest in the fleet, but are a few years old now.

The next generation, the 7000 Series, will be different from anything we have now. But one thing's pretty sure: We won't have another generation of rail cars with carpet.