Of those 10 allegedly dangerous metro stations (and, note that even the worst station is still reporting a rate of only 5 incidents a month), only 2 are ones a tourist would have any reason to go near. Those two are Gallery Place and L'Enfant Plaza, both of which are major transfer stations (as well as being close to tourist attractions). I have seen groups of brawling teenagers at L'Enfant Plaza, but they were easily avoided and the police appeared to come promptly.

I was surprised to see Vienna on the list, as I live across the street from that station and there have been exactly 2 crimes in my neighborhood in the 7 years that I've lived there. Unless all of those crimes are on the Fairfax side of the station (which I doubt, since I lived a few blocks down on that side before I bought my current place), I suspect that a lot of the incidents there are thefts of GPS units from cars in the parking lot.

Also, most of the reported crimes are snatch thefts, almost entirely of electronics. If you actually pay attention to things around you, that is easy to avoid. There is a bit of a campaign now warning people about cell phone thefts, especially from people sitting / standing next to the doors.

At any rate, I generally feel safe walking around parts of the city that a tourist would be go to. It is not unusual for me to walk, say, down 14th street from Logan Circle to McPherson Square after getting out of a theatre at 10 p.m. or to walk from near the verizon Center to Metro Center to avoid having long waits for tran transfers.