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| Artist's rendering; not an official Washington Metro map. |
It felt weird trying to cram this stuff into the Accommodations section, so here we are.
Most importantly, there will be a shuttle bus (or multiple buses) to take people from the Dupont Circle Hotel to the church for the ceremony, and back. So if you're staying at the DCH, you're set. If not, you can either make your way to the church on your own, and get a ride over to the hotel for the reception, or come to the hotel and get a ride to and from the church. We don't have a schedule for the buses yet. Once we do we will post it here.
That covers the time period encompassing the wedding and the reception. As for the rest of the weekend...
Flights/airport transit: DC is served by three airports: Reagan/National (DCA), Dulles (IAD), and Baltimore-Washington (BWI). In terms of convenience, flying into DCA is definitely preferable, but the flights are often more expensive for this reason. DCA is about a 10 minute, $15 cab ride from downtown DC.
IAD and BWI are perfectly suitable alternatives and flights into those are often cheaper than those into DCA. You can reach downtown DC from IAD via a commuter bus connection to the DC Metro, but that might not be the best idea (see below). This can take upward of 75 minutes. If you want to cab, that will run you about $60-$70 depending on traffic. An Uber will cost less than that--I've actually never taken one from IAD but I'd guess it's about $40. Depending on traffic the drive tends to be about 40 to 50 minutes.
You can also use a bus-Metro two legged trip to reach DC from BWI, but the same caveats described below apply. BWI is further away than IAD, so a cab will run up to $100, while an Uber will be in the $60-$70 range. The easier alternative, depending on your schedule, is to take a free shuttle bus to the nearby train station, and take either an Amtrak or MARC (Maryland regional rail--you want the Penn Line) train to Union Station in DC. From there it's a quick cab ride to the hotel. Check amtrak.com or mta.maryland.gov/marc-train for schedules and pricing.
What about car rental: I would not recommend renting a car unless you have a specific reason to do so, like wanting to visit friends or relatives who live in the DC suburbs sometime during the weekend. Parking is expensive and once you're in downtown DC, you don't need a car to get anywhere.
Getting around DC, other than from the hotel to the church: When it's running well, the DC Metro system is a great option for getting all over the city on the cheap. Unfortunately, right now and for the foreseeable future, including this fall, it's not running well at all. There's a huge push going on to get a ton of maintenance that's been delayed for way too long done in the next year. Orchestrating such a push requires frequent shutdowns of lines and unpredictable delays. You can certainly still use it, but don't count on it being reliable. Cabs and Ubers are the much better way to get around the city, at least for short and medium distances.
