Small update: Transit agenda for Greater Baltimore

As discussed in the previous post, "Transit "wokeness" in DC and Baltimore," but reminded by the media coverage of an agreement to improve the B&P Tunnel ("Amtrak, Maryland DOT Debut B&P Tunnel Replacement Plan," Railway Age), which slipped my mind, I forgot to include additional suggestions for transit improvements in Greater Baltimore, from comments on a 2020 GGW post, ""Maryland looks at connecting MARC toward Philadelphia and within Baltimore."

This is the plan for the B&P Tunnel, which will improve the routing and increase the height.

Here is the expanded list.

1.  Extend the transit lines within the city and county and connect them better.  Plus extend light rail to Columbia in Howard County.  ("From the files: transit planning in Baltimore County," 2012) And extend the line northward to the major office district in Cockeysville.

-- Additional Point #1

Construct new Metro Heavy Rail Lines: (1) a new Metro line from Ellicott City to the existing Metro line, with stations along the route (using the old mainline to the B&O museum and having a station under UMMC, along with stations in Catonsville, UMBC etc), and new Metro lines from (2) JHU northeast along the Belair Road and (3) southeast to Canton and Dundalk. (rouge_foreigner)  Covered but not to this level of detail in #1 in the original list.

2.  Create a true regional rail system for Greater Baltimore (and DC), modeled after the German S-Bahn approach.  Integrate MARC into the transit systems in Baltimore City and Greater DC.  Expand the number of intra-city stations in Baltimore especially ("Baltimore City Mayoral candidates views on transportation (and other matters)") (but also DC).  ("One big idea: Getting MARC and Metrorail to integrate fares, stations, and marketing systems, using London Overground as an example," 2015 and others).  

Besides the S-Bahn, The RER (Paris), and London Overground are examples of a regional rail system.  RER is known for undergrounded lines.  (Greater New York has a lot of regional rail, but the system is balkanized across multiple systems and doesn't incorporate through routing.)

In the MARC Growth and Investment Plan from the early 2000s, they proposed three infill railroad stations in Baltimore (Bayview--Hopkins and Madison Square in East Baltimore and Upton in West Baltimore) as well as an upgrade of the West Baltimore station.   The suggestions below add many more infill stations not just in the city but in the counties too.

-- AP 2. Provide a minimum of hourly service in each direction on the Penn Line from 4 am to 2 am.  (marc),  Currently the service runs from 4:45 am to 9:45 pm south from Baltimore to Washington, and from 6:15 am to 10:45 pm from Washington to Baltimore.

-- AP 3.  Electrify the Camden and Brunswick Lines and straighten the routing where appropriate to shorten trip times.  (rouge_foreigner)

-- AP 4.  Extend the Camden Line underground to Penn Station (kk).

A London Overground Station.

-- AP 5.  Combine the St. Denis Station on the Camden Line  by moving it to the Halethorpe Station on the Penn Line to interconnect the lines.  (kk and rouge_foreigner)  (This is also relevant to this post, "Two train/regional transit ideas: Part 2 | Running tourist trains from Union Station.")

-- AP 6.  Add infill stations at Morell Park/Irvington and Lakeland (kk).   

-- AP 7.  Construct a new airport MARC line that allows for a station directly under BWI, probably involving a spur from the Penn Line connecting to the Camden Line on the north side. Airport spurs are about the only kind that are useful in regional rail. (rouge_foreigner)  

-- AP 8.  WRT the B&P Tunnel, rouge_foreigner recommends routing a new tunnel through downtown Baltimore under US 40,  and adding 5 stations: a new central station downtown, roughly at where Metro West is now, and new stations adjacent to the Jones Falls Valley, Johns Hopkins, Elwood Park and Bayview, and four tracking the tunnel (like the Penn Line). Four-tracking enables Amtrak and MARC express service and aims for 30 minute travel time to Baltimore on express.

-- AP 9. Shift the Camden Line alignment before the stadium complex and put it up Russell Street with a new Camden Station near the intersection of Russell Street and MLK Avenue and a northward alignment to Baltimore County and Pennsylvania with multiple new stations including under UM Medical Center, intersecting with the Penn Line in that central station under Metro West (and also the Metro and Light Rail via a tunnel to Lexington Market), then north to stops at a new Penn Station, JHU-Homewood, Loyola/Notre Dame, Towson University, Towson, [ed: + Cockeysville/Hunt Valley], and then on to York and Harrisburg in Pennsylvania. (rouge_foreigner)  (In a way, this re-creates the old Maryland Central Railroad, which  in the 1880s went as far as Lake Ontario in New York State.  Part of its routing is used for the Baltimore Light Rail line.)

-- AP  10. Construct a new electrified mainline from Baltimore to Frederick largely along I-70, primarily to avoid having to shunt freight through DC, and run MARC service on it as well (thus also connecting intermediate stops, including the Social Security office complex, Security Square, and others—in Baltimore County, this scheme would largely supplant the since cancelled Red Line light rail proposal). (rouge_foreigner)

-- AP 11. Construct a MARC line from the new mainline by I-70 and 32 or 97 to Annapolis, connecting Columbia, the Penn and Camden lines, Ft Meade, and Annapolis, and potentially even on to the Eastern Shore and Ocean City to alleviate traffic on the Bay Bridge and Route 50.  (rouge_foreigner) 

3.  Merge the Maryland and Virginia Passenger Rail services, starting with the MARC Penn Line and the VRE Fredericksburg Line. ("A new backbone for the regional transit system: merging the MARC Penn and VRE Fredericksburg Lines")

4.  Create a true statewide passenger rail program, connecting western, eastern, and southern Maryland to DC and Baltimore.  ("A "Transformational Projects Action Plan" for a statewide passenger railroad program in Maryland.," 2019)

Note that 

-- AP 9 -- creating a new line northward to Baltimore County and Pennsylvania

-- AP 10 -- creating a new line from Baltimore to Frederick

-- AP 11 -- creating a new line from Baltimore to Annapolis with the potential for extension to the Eastern Shore 

are also relevant to the development of a statewide railroad passenger program as distinct from a regional railroad system for Baltimore modeled on the S-Bahn/London Overground concept.

5.  Upgrade the light rail vehicles in Baltimore, rebrand them, and make other surface transit improvements as necessary. ("Baltimore City Mayoral candidates views on transportation (and other matters" and "Part 7 | Using the Purple Line to rebrand Montgomery and Prince George's Counties as Design Forward")