Montgomery and DC officials start talking about working together on transit
DC is designing a streetcar that could end just shy of the Maryland line, while Montgomery County is planning Bus Rapid Transit lines that could dead-end at the border with the District. Can the two transportation departments work together? Officials from both jurisdictions met last week to see if they could build some cooperation.
Montgomery and DC leaders recognize that their residents don’t consider political boundaries as they go about their daily lives, yet have so far been planning new transit lines in their own silos. New transit lines will be more successful if leaders ensure they serve the right destinations and have integrated schedules, payment, and pedestrian connections.
Will the streetcar go to Silver Spring?
DDOT planners have specified either Takoma or Silver Spring as possible endpoints for the Georgia Avenue streetcar. Jobs and housing density, not to mention the “vast majority of comments” that DDOT has received, point to Silver Spring as the best destination.
Montgomery planner Dave Anspacher said that the county’s master plan includes dedicated lanes for transit on Georgia Avenue south of the Metro. But DDOT Associate Director Sam Zimbabwe noted that there would be many challenges. Montgomery County would probably not let DC construct the streetcar into Silver Spring on its own, so any connection would require very close coordination.
Will BRT connect to DC?
Several routes in Montgomery County’s Bus Rapid Transit plan run up to the DC line, but there are no plans for what to do beyond that. Officials discussed how these lines could reach into the District to either get farther downtown or end at a suitable Metro station.
New Hampshire Avenue: The line for New Hamsphire Avenue could end at Fort Totten Metro, just like the current K6 and K9 WMATA buses that serve that corridor. Zimbabwe said that leaving New Hampshire out of MoveDC “may have been a gap,” but also expressed skepticism about dedicated lanes within DC because New Hampshire narrows from six to four lanes at the DC line.
WMATA’s K buses on New Hampshire Avenue currently cross into DC to serve Fort Totten Metro. Map from WMATA.
Wisconsin Avenue: Last fall, the Montgomery County Council approved a “dotted line” for the 355/Wisconsin Avenue BRT line to Friendship Heights (and beyond), pending collaboration with the District. The idea, said Anspacher, would be to bring BRT south towards Georgetown to serve the parts of Wisconsin without Red Line service.
Wisconsin Avenue is in fact a “high capacity transit corridor” in the moveDC plan, DDOT officials pointed out, so this connection is a distinct possibility, though potentially far off.
16th Street: The BRT master plan includes the short part of Colesville Road/16th Street to the DC line south of the Silver Spring Metro for dedicated transit lanes. Anspacher said the county would be willing to explore uses this space to help with DC and WMATA’s efforts to improve the overcrowded S bus lines.
There’s more work to be done
Arlington and Fairfax counties have worked together on the Columbia Pike streetcar. Arlington and Alexandria are collaborating on the Potomac Yards-Crystal City BRT project. And of course Montgomery and Prince George’s have worked together on the Purple Line. These show that cooperation is possible.
At the same time, all of those examples sit entirely within one state, so it may take more work to create a Montgomery-DC transit service. WMATA could also help serve a convening role and has the authority to act as the regional transit planning authority.
Montgomery and DC officials agreed to meet again soon on specific projects, with 16th Street and Wisconsin Avenue as the top priorities. As Montgomery County’s transportation committee chair Roger Berliner said, “Every day tens of thousands of commuters clog our roads to get to you, and then clog your roads. We have a mutual interest in solving that problem.”
This meeting was a great start, but there will have to be many more at many different levels to truly build the best transit projects and the most effective integrated network for riders and the region.