D.C. Metro Purple Line: Yes Or No?
Jeffrey Hill | Tue, Aug 12th, 2008 | Category: Report | City: Washington, D.C. | Tags: jeffrey hill, environment, green, suburbs, transit, construction, 2008, metro, development, maryland, suburb, amtrak, trains, planning, neighborhoods, martin o'malley, purple line
Chicago engineer Harry Weese designed the Brutalist, Modern Metro system for Washington D.C. as a spoke-hub system. At the end of these spokes lay D.C.’s suburbs — Montgomergy County, Falls Church, Franconia, Prince George’s County and Alexandria among others. The lines provide a clear line of transport into the heart of the city, however, suburb-to-suburb travel remains inconvenient. The Metro’s Red Line, for example, dips into D.C. as a “U” — from Shady Grove and Rockville to Silver Spring and Glenmont — a half-hour trip from either side. Traveling from Rockville to Silver Springs, on the other hand, takes well over an hour and longer during peak times. The solution has been presented as a new Purple line, which would connect the northern, Maryland spokes of the Metro wheel. Not everyone is excited about the new, above-ground light rail system. As with any major urban development, there are plenty of arguments and local politics involved.
Residents of Chevy Chase, an upscale northwestern D.C. suburb, are the main opponents of the light-rail Purple line. They say that a bus system would be cheaper, more efficient and more likely to receive federal funding.
Town leaders, who have objected to rail line along the Capital Crescent Trail between Bethesda and Silver Spring, said the report supports their contention that rapid buses running along Jones Bridge Road north of the trail would be more cost effective. Leaders said the study, released by a Montgomery planning board committee this week, shows that the state could build lanes and purchase buses for both a Purple Line and a Corridor Cities Transitway along the Interstate 270 corridor for less than $1 billion total. By comparison, a light rail Purple Line alone is estimated to cost as much as $1.8 billion. - from The Washington Post, July 25, 2008
The Greater Bethesda-Chevy Chase Coalition, whose mission statement is “To foster the creation of green space in the urban environment,” say that the Purple Line, which is proposed to be built above ground, should be buried underground.
Larry Rosen, a resident of Silver Spring, wrote to Gazette.net - “The point of a Purple Line must be to reduce traffic on our roads and the Beltway. It must be faster, more convenient, and cheaper than driving. The only choices are for an underground or an elevated train or express bus route. An elevated route would be like those in Chicago, traveling high above the cars. The disadvantage is they are unsightly. An underground route is the best, but the most expensive.”
Advocates and proponents of the Purple Line include The Washington Post, Chevy Chase Land Co., Maryland Governor Martin O’Malley (D) and a pro-Purple umbrella group called Purple Line NOW!
An opposing group, The Save The Crescent Trail Petition, argues that The Purple Line threatens the existence of The Crescent Trail, used by more than 1.5 million hikers and bikers every year. Their argument: “In the increasingly urbanized environment of lower Montgomery County, the Capital Crescent Trail provides a unique opportunity for families and friends to find recreation and peaceful reflection, in a natural setting. If run along the Capital Crescent Trail, the Purple Line would have a devastating effect on the Trail and surrounding communities. There is no transit system in the United States that runs trains or buses so frequently and so fast, while running so close to a popular trail, homes, and apartments, as the proposed light rail, Purple Line between Bethesda and Silver Spring.”
It seems as if the implementation of the Purple Line is more or less a battle of green intentions—save energy or physical green space, convenience and traffic management versus residential comfort. What takes priority here?
The facts on the Purple Line are available here. Also interesting to note, the projected usage of the Purple Line has been estimated at 68,000 per day.
Sound off on your opinions concerning the Purple Line. Is the billion dollar system worth connecting Bethesda, Chevy Chase, Silver Spring and New Carrollton? (Note that this also connects these neighborhoods with Amtrak) Are Chevy Chase citizens truly concerned with costs or more worried about the noise of construction? Is there a commuter demand between Bethesda and Silver Spring?
Jeffrey Hill is News Editor for Access Intelligence, a business and technology information firm, web editor for Next American City and a freelance writer based in Washington D.C.
Shekb
Tue, Aug 12, 2008 at 10:55am
I’m for it however it gets done. I strongly disagree with the notion that Chicago style els are “unsightly”, or at least the idea that a train necessarily has to be. That smells suspiciously like a nimby argument to me. A train might cost more at the outset, but would save in the long term.
Chris L in Washington DC
Tue, Aug 12, 2008 at 11:18am
The whole “Save the Trail from the Purple Line” argument a red-herring, put forth by Chevy Chase residents who don’t want a light-rail train running near their golf course, despite the massive benefits the Purple Line will create for all residents of suburban Maryland. The MTA plans to run the purple line adjacent to the CC Trail, separating the two by a wide median of vegetation. At NO POINT would the Purple Line disturb the existing Capital Crescent Trail. Check out the links below for pics of the proposed alignment:
http://home.comcast.net/~phyilla1/sstrails/MTAjonesmill.jpg
http://home.comcast.net/~phyilla1/sstrails/cct.html
Chris L
Tue, Aug 12, 2008 at 11:25am
Just for good measure- lots of other examples from around the country of rails coexisting peacefully with trails:
http://home.comcast.net/~phyilla1/sstrails/railswithtrails.html
Don’t let these NIMBYs spoil such an important project for the whole DC area!
Jeffrey Hill in Washington, D.C.
Tue, Aug 12, 2008 at 8:03pm
Hey Shekb. Sorry about the pluralized Spring in the first graph. It would be nice if the town discovered more than one spring ... then we wouldn’t have this problem, would we? A joke. This board can get a little hostile.
Matt in Ex-DC
Wed, Aug 13, 2008 at 4:30pm
As a former resident of a Red Line community, I understand that travel “cross county” is difficult. However, this link may harm the urban neighborhoods of Washington for the benefit of suburban MontCo. A multi-jurisdictional system like Metro should be feeding the core (DC), not siphoning wealthier residents away from it.
One also may wonder if the Purple Line opponents objecting to the expense of it, the use of the Crescent Trail, or the fact that it would give 68,000 minorities in Prince George’s County easier access to their jobs and communities?
James Klich in Charlotte, North Carolina
Sat, Aug 16, 2008 at 1:10am
The purple line looks like a great idea. I would start as soon as the money is there.
Dan R in Silver Spring, MD
Sat, Aug 16, 2008 at 3:02pm
“the fact that it would give 68,000 minorities in Prince George’s County easier access to their jobs and communities?”
No one ever said that a) all Purple Line/transit riders are minorities, especially in the Washington, D.C. area, where studies show that two-thirds of Metrorail riders are white and b) that they’re all coming from Prince George’s County. This is the argument that the NIMBYs in Bethesda-Chevy Chase use: “I can see why they’d want to come here, but why would we want to go over there?”
Talk to people in Bethesda and Chevy Chase and they’ll make it clear real fast: They don’t know anything about the rest of the Purple Line route, or the people it would serve, and they don’t care, so long as the Capital Crescent Trail remains a resource solely accessible to the people in their own wealthy neighborhoods.
Jim
Mon, Aug 18, 2008 at 10:22am
This Purple Line Light Rail is being shoe-horned in by developers to lift dvelopment ceilings along the route. It uses different cars than the Metro adn cannot be extended West from Bethesda or SE from New Carrolton. It is a boondoggle.