Purple Line writings

Both Greater Greater Washington, in "The Purple Line is cost effective and a great idea, too" (by occasional commenter Cavan) and DCist, in "Opinionist: Ryan Avent," have good features on building the Purple Line light rail in Montgomery and Prince George's Counties.

1. Yes, in an ideal world, heavy rail (underground subway) would be better but there isn't the money for it.

2. No, Bus Rapid Transit isn't a better solution in terms of either total ridership, speed, or the positive impact on reshaping land use.

The idea of a circumferential Purple Line _heavy rail subway route_ connecting the spokes of the Metrorail system was first proposed by Mark Jenkins, then an urban design columnist for the Washington City Paper, in the early 1990s, in a City Paper cover story. After the proposal, the Metro area Sierra Club chapter, and Montgomery County's Action Coalition for Transit, took up the idea and kept it in the limelight in the off again on again travails.

In 2005, the Washington Post ran a story about how with the approval of the freeway Inter County Connector, the Purple Line was dead, in "Fortunes Shift for East-West Rail Plan; Purple Line Stalls, Connector Thrives."

Bus ad for the Washington Post, 2005.

To their credit, Action Coalition for Transit kept with it, and made the Purple Line an issue in the 2006 Montgomery County Council elections.

Excerpt from campaign literature for Hans Riemer. He lost, but most candidates took a pro-Purple Line position. These days, Hans is probably one of the reasons for a strong on-the-ground campaign for the Obama Campaign.

With the concomitant change in leadership of the State of Maryland at the Governorship level in the 2006 election, when Democrat Martin O'Malley defeated anti-transit Republican Robert Ehrlich, a rejuvenated Maryland Transit Administration began focusing on transit expansion rather than limiting transit, both in terms of potential light rail projects as well as expansion of the MARC _commuter_ railroad system into a more broadly conceived railroad passenger program service to include beyond that of the commuter.

Now, the Purple Line looks more and more like a project that will become reality. At least in a portion of the original route as conceived by Mark Jenkins.

Now there needs to be a further push on the Virginia side. Of course, Virginia's energies are focused on the extension of heavy rail to the Dulles Airport (the "Silver Line").