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  • WMATA - Board meeting to consider expansion options

  • Discussion related to DC area passenger rail services from Northern Virginia to Baltimore, MD. Includes Light Rail and Baltimore Subway.
Discussion related to DC area passenger rail services from Northern Virginia to Baltimore, MD. Includes Light Rail and Baltimore Subway.

Moderators: mtuandrew, therock, Robert Paniagua

 #1579963  by JDC
 
As detailed in a WaPo piece, the Metro Board will meet this week to discuss the results of a two-year study of possible alternatives for expanding Metro rail. The study's recommended option is an expanded Blue line, which would "align the Blue Line from Arlington Cemetery to a second Rosslyn station. The line would then continue northeast through a new Potomac River tunnel into Georgetown to Union Station. From there, it would extend south to the Waterfront and Navy Yard, drop down to National Harbor in Prince George’s County, before crossing the Woodrow Wilson Bridge to Alexandria and north to the Pentagon." More details and graphics are here https://www.washingtonpost.com/transpor ... extension/
 #1579975  by Sand Box John
 
Blue/Orange/Silver Capacity & Reliability Study
(10.1 MB PDF file) 09 03 2021 1723

Most here know my thoughts on how WMATA should address their capacity issue. With that being said here are my thoughts:
  • I find the "Not An LPA Recommendation" to be some what amusing. The Silver Draft Environmental Impact Statement plan had a pocket track east of the McLean Station. It was deleted in the final plan to cut costs. Now improving reliability of the D&G pocket track would be pretty simple. Simpley modify the signalling system to make trains treat the pocket track as if it were a station. When a train come to a stop in the pocket track and transmit it's train birthed signal to wayside, operating in either automatic or manual mode, way side drops the interlocking signal on the exit end from Lunar to Red.
  • From a boardings point the Silver line to Greenbelt or New Carrollton would be unbalanced as the east end of the railroad has traditionally generated fewer boarding then west ends of the Blue and Orange lines. <sarcasm>Both do provide the option extending the Silver line to BWI.</sarcasm>
  • Silver line express forgets that the branch signalling system is designed to accommodate 135 second headways.
  • The Blue line loop takes away a hell of a lot of one seat ride station pairs and creates significant number of new ones.