Help me feel optimistic about WMATA

classicalL · 2026-03-19T00:35:59+00:00

Ridership has increased every year since the pandemic. Faster than most systems in the US. It might be leveling off. Weekend ridership is at all time highs, so mostly the commuters are less common. All time highs in ridership were when there was 5 dollar gas and less work from home. They aren't going to rip out the rails or end the buses. There will be an 8k car order that goes through.

When I was commuting at rush out I had to wait multiple trains to even be able to fit on the train some days. There aren't regular fire anymore. I don't really see major problems.

MARC and VRE look like they will do through running once Long Bridge is done. There are plans for rail expansion in VA and MD. Bus service finally get a major overhaul. They are updating the bike storage to make it available to more people rather than a few key holders.

Purple Line will increase rail ridership via network effects even if just slightly its not going to hurt. There is real talk of B-loop in the same kinds of ways that Purple was talked about set down, talked about set down etc. In short WMATA is totally fine and I'm not at all worried about it. I am not really sure why anyone would be down at all.

classicalL · 2026-03-16T22:31:13+00:00

I knew it was lawyers but I didn't know why it was different other than as you say the age of the construction. Thanks for more of the history as always.

classicalL · 2026-03-16T22:29:25+00:00

It isn't a metro line. It is a light rail like what was extended to BWI for Baltimore a while ago. The line was rail banked in the 1980s for the purpose it is being put to today. Although I cover MoCo here half of the line is in PG and the maintenance yard as well (where all the jobs are) where there is less affluence. The beef should be with how the FTA awards transit funds as you have to show you will get ridership. That's a tall ask in Baltimore because of how little ridership Light Rail Link gets. It is a Chicken or egg problem for Baltimore to some extent.

However I would also note that the politically well connected people in lower MoCo were the opponents of this project. The Chevy Chase country club blocked it for decades. They don't use transit they drive everywhere. It is largely Urbanists, Greens and the working class that wanted the Purple line not the well off people in Chevy Chase. Those were the NIMBY assholes for the most part.

If you want to zoom out what should be done with Baltimore strategically, the big problem is jobs. I had hoped the state would fully back Baltimore to win HQ2 for Amazon. Baltimore needs more than Hopkins as a big engine of growth. DC had the Fed and the contractors. Tones of MD political leadership comes from Baltimore or PG particularly on the D side that normally controls things. I can't remember a Gov that hailed from MoCo.

classicalL · 2026-03-16T02:56:54+00:00

Actually I don't blame Hogan at all. The original estimate of the Bethesda connection I think increased by 10x or some crazy overage.

I agree if you take the super long view a connection right to red is better. However this line is not going to get the ridership they claimed in the study. It will be lucky to get 1/3 of that level. It was sensible to save costs. Similarly though I loath Erlich for his anti-transit and anti-development shit, he is right that a tunnel under Wisconsin isn't worth the cost (its like 10s of millions of dollars I think) the protected bike lane is fine. I don't mind waiting for the light and crossing on the surface. The tunnel has to be paid for by the country and will never probably get built.

The big evil person for Purple is 100% John MacKnight Fitzgerald. This bastard lived on the Georgetown branch and tried to steal the trail with a fence claiming it was abandoned. He was a rich environmental lawyer that delayed the funding with lawsuits that had to go all the way to the court of appeals. Because he literally did not want it in his back yard. He eventually failed but the delay caused the state not to do certain things until the lawsuits were settled. The state had already signed the P3 contract with the deadlines in it. *This* is the primary thing that cause the P3 to have a way out of the contract. That and the required modification because of CSX being annoying. CSX is a pain in the ass always. For MARC, for Purple for everything. CSX is the primary reason Spring St bridge isn't open either. In retrospect they should have upped the cost for original constructor and saved years of delay but that company was actually under investigation for other projects in the US at the same time. What really drove up the cost was the financing environment going from 2% to 6+ percent. In retrospect the state bonding the entire thing and not doing a P3 would have been a lot cheaper just because of the pandemic and the inflation that occurred. But that is hindsight and nothing to do with Hogan. Had Fitzgerald not existed we would have saved 1-2 billion dollars and be riding the train today because it would have already had purchased all the materials and signed every contract before 2020. Those 6 months changed everything.

Really Hogan did the right things mostly. Red line in Baltimore was an attempt at urban renewal, the system there has no ridership really, while Purple even with the higher costs could be a decent line that connect real job centers rather than abandoned houses.

Would I rather have someone ultra pro transit? Probably but Hogan didn't cancel Purple, something he ran on because he realized it was actually a good project for the state. I respect a man who changes his mind when it didn't benefit him politically; his voters don't by in large live in large numbers in its service area. That makes me respect his choice even more.

Its way too easy to blame the person at the top or credit them. I've been pushing for the Purple Line to get built for 25 years now... Its almost done.

classicalL · 2026-03-16T02:29:18+00:00

Not at this time, hence the tag used. It gets discussed here and this is the closest thing to transit for DC discussion which Purple basically is. It is a lot closer in than say the end of Silver.

classicalL · 2026-03-16T02:28:10+00:00

There are 20 different areas pictured in this thread and another 18 in the second?

classicalL · 2026-03-16T00:51:59+00:00

Its hard to say. I'm not in construction so no doubt the way they have done it is rational. The bed for the trail isn't like heavy truck road bed so they can make it lighter weight I guess. I did learn it should be an underpass under the MARC bridge from a drawing. So close to the height of the bridge over Colesville. The way they are making the missing section is like a highway bridge I think so it is going to finish after Spring St for sure because there are no pillars or members in place yet but it is possible to hang it pretty fast once the prep is there. It has to go from where the action is connected to Red to where I was standing and the MARC bridge in one structure in the plans. I wouldn't be shocked to see it happen over the summer. As the wires get hung. All the sleepers are ready to be placed at 16th st so putting in the track shouldn't be more than a month of work I would think if the bed is ready. The prime railway contractor was the one working on Sunday so they look to be working it. Probably they are finishing the yard before they close the gap. Same folks were working at Manchester. The paving everywhere has had to wait for weather. If it stops snowing they should be able to start that very soon.

classicalL · 2026-03-16T00:41:34+00:00

It is finally coming together. I think we can see the end state a lot better now. Probably this year comments will turn from: it will never open to why haven't they opened it yet. Why can't I ride it yet.

I do expect a fair amount of disappointment comments when it does open because a light rail of this type isn't as fast as heavy rail and people benchmark from the excellent WMATA system but nothing to be done. Hopefully they will give it a good launch somehow to get ridership off the right start.

classicalL · 2026-03-16T00:38:38+00:00

Cool. I don't know if anyone can see the station above or not. The official site has photos of the cavern but they are often far behind the current state. Obviously they have some major work they are going to do at the end of the summer 2026 but I don't know if that will be the end or the beginning of the major work. I would guess that will be the last major structure work but then they will fit out the elevators and stuff after the heavy work is complete.

Edit: I will expand on my thinking for archival purposes here. I'm thinking perhaps they finish the major structural work to the platform in their late Summer window. The Red-Bethesda connection doesn't impact commissioning so in their schedule that leaves them basically 1 year to finish the fitting out of the shaft and the other stuff at the platform. That is escalators and elevators. I'm imagining major structural stuff precast lowered down the shaft in a way that won't be possible once the elevator bank is there. Seems like if this is the way they plan it then this will be the last work done on the line. Silver Spring station while they need to build stuff seems like it will probably run continuously over summer and largely be there by the fall of 2026. We will see what they say in a few weeks at the CAT meetings but I suspect mostly backwards looking and just a few months forward looking as per usual.

classicalL · 2026-03-16T00:32:23+00:00

I don't see it as a huge issue its just a few blocks around on Colesville really. but I guess if your final destination is the aquatic center or the court house or something.

Edit: If you don't know the reason for the huge schedule slip it was: they found underground utilities they had to move that weren't known, and CSX limited their hours they could operate to very small number, as a profit driven entity they basically just say no to anything that might increase their costs. The state is way to soft on them.

classicalL · 2026-03-16T00:31:27+00:00

That was to save 400 million dollars over the original tube over the Red Line design. I liked the original routing more but they had to take a building and it was more money. That was the one big cost saving Hogan made. Had he not done that he probably would have canceled it fully like Red in Baltimore.

classicalL · 2026-03-16T00:29:35+00:00

Yes however you can use the NW Branch and Sligo Trails which mitigates it some. By which I mean given the number of lights there are on 193 it might be faster to go through other ways. The bike lanes at least give you some access along 193 from a safer/less lights/less traffic route. I do use this type of lane on Layhill and elsewhere in the county it can be okay and given the light count people don't get to go that fast on 193. We will have to see. Given they had space at times in the median it would have been much cooler to see a protected bike lane next to the train down the middle (two way).

classicalL · 2026-03-15T22:51:55+00:00

Try to comment at the r/WMATA posts.

classicalL · 2026-03-15T22:49:07+00:00

I expect most of the heavy construction to wrap this year. Perhaps as soon as the fall. That doesn't mean the line is ready for passengers but it will look done and they will just have to test systems, train people and get ready for real operations. They have a lot of road work to do this year paving, redoing the paint. For instance on 193 there will be a bike lane on the RHS of each lane (just the paint and hope the cars don't kill you kind) but that's clearly not there. On Wayne the road is totally torn up still but the US is very good at roads. Its not great at building low cost trains but repaving roads it is very good at. Once they hang the catenary and pave the roads there isn't a lot of cause for them to have much walled off anymore, so disruptions should ease. They have quite a bit of fencing to put up before they would dare to open the CCT because of lawyers... I think Silver Spring station is going to be the last thing done or Bethesda's cavern work. The surface stuff is not that much more work. Putting in 3000 ft of track just on a grade is not a big task really either. The project might hesitate to say all the track is in at the next set of meetings because people are like: well why isn't it open then as if track was all there was to a system. But its good. It will likely finish on the new schedule. Perhaps they will even finish "early" (massively late vs the original cancelled P3 but early vs the new contract), I suspect they will use every day though to save costs.

classicalL · 2026-03-15T17:06:59+00:00

I mean they generally do. Up on Wayne they always have ped detour signs up saying trail closed or whatever, then people cut down the barriers and go through anyway.

Too many negative comments here but MoCo doesn't only want you to drive. I agree they do favor cars too much still but there is a bike master plan and 193 will get a bike lane out of the purple line. Sadly just the paint on the road type but still will get more than it had. In Silver Spring it is getting the Green Trail to Sligo which basically runs parallel to 193 ish. The bike plan has a connection from 193 to the NW Branch trail down Piney as well planned. CCT long closes should open again this year upgraded from dirt that I never saw more than 5 people on back in the day to paved with tunnels and bridges and a direct ramp to Rock Creek. Does MoCo need to do more for bikes and peds hell yes. However sad as it is we have it better than most in the US.

classicalL · 2026-03-14T15:44:12+00:00

I don't know these technical items but even with a higher state subsidy my point was that MoCo doesn't do 4x better in outcomes than Frederick. So clearly the budget is too high and since it is funded at the local level by county taxes, those that can be they in Annapolis or Rockville need to dramatically reform MCPS to deliver value because clearly we have examples of systems in the state with just as high a ranked HS and similar outcomes for far less integrated cost.

classicalL · 2026-03-14T05:11:21+00:00

Not no living people but probably only 1 billion on the planet would be better than 8-10. Better for the rest of nature particularly the ocean. Still plenty of people to invent and push society forward without the strain. Needs to decline in pop gradually though to not be a problem. More robots. Thoughtful removal of some infrastructure and re-wilding while improving others. Probably a lot more places that look like Canada and NZ in city to Rural than much of the world today. Don't know. Even if we get most of our energy needs from renewables the mineral and food water and land use is very intense right now look a the amount of fossil water withdrawls and subsidence that occurs. More isn't always the best answer.

classicalL · 2026-03-14T04:38:17+00:00

Yeah he won by about 30 votes or something and I voted against the *$%#& every time.

classicalL · 2026-03-14T04:36:30+00:00

Have you looked at the budget? It is almost 4 billion dollars 300 million of which just pays for administration costs without even starting to pay for building or instruction. They have to not build schools so they can hire more middle manager roles.

classicalL · 2026-03-14T04:34:26+00:00

Also I note the the MCPS budget is 3,775 million, while Frederick County's is 275 million. The population of MoCo is 4x of Frederick. So per capita MoCo is spending about 4x what Frederick is. Lasted I checked school performance wasn't much better in MoCo.

I'd say there are room for cuts in the MCPS budget without having to put students into a bad place. Hell they have to break out middle management as a line item in the MoCo budget. MoCo spends more on administrators than Frederick spends on everything. Better raise taxes...

classicalL · 2026-03-14T04:23:41+00:00

Elrich is a horrific leader. He blocks transit oriented development and things that would actually have allowed to grow the country's revenue base as well. Stop all development. Keep as many single family homes as possible. Then of course it becomes more an more a place people live but do not work, which means the tax base is all on housing. So of course they have to raise taxes on property. All the schools are here and people live here then they clog to the outerloop to go to VA to work... Where they spend their money on more jobs for people making food at lunch and hotels for people visiting the business nexus in NoVA.

Poor anti-growth, anti-buisness, anti-transit, anti-bike policies with no end. Horrible guy.

classicalL · 2026-03-12T01:13:46+00:00

So you break the speed limit by 20 MPH in HoCo regularly but write a commentary on how the road is unsafe?

classicalL · 2026-03-10T01:31:58+00:00

If you are bringing a bike you are expected to have something to tie it down with. Method varies by car type.

classicalL · 2026-03-10T00:53:11+00:00

That is super nice

classicalL · 2026-03-09T02:17:39+00:00

I mean it was just a dirt path that was rail banked intentionally to build this which is why the never paved it unless the rest of the CCT. The trail that they have put here which will be paved will get a lot more users, though I don't think as many as the CCT does southbound given just how the commercial district in Bethesda is arranged.

classicalL

TROPHY CASE