Washington DC: Metro considers Georgetown station, Blue Line expansion to address future ridership

[marmar]

Ridership on Metrorail in the D.C. region is expected to increase over the coming years, and transportation officials are considering how to address that growth.

A Georgetown Metro station and a Blue Line expansion to National Harbor are among the options raised in a future capacity and reliability study published this week by Metro’s Finance and Capital Committee.



The plan could include a realignment of the Blue Line, the addition of a second Rosslyn Metro station and the construction a new tunnel to a new Georgetown station.

That could cost between $20 billion and $25 billion and be the most significant improvement for ridership growth. It would expand ridership by 180,000 weekday trips and generate $154 million in annual revenue. ...........(more)

https://wtop.com/tracking-metro-24-7/2021/09/metro-considers-a-new-georgetown-station-blue-line-expansion-to-address-future-ridership/

[mahatmakanejeeves]

1. A Metro line down Columbia Pike is no longer being considered by WMATA. But a second Rosslyn ...

Thanks for starting the thread. I'll add:

A Metro line down Columbia Pike is no longer being considered by WMATA. But a second Rosslyn Metro station and Potomac tunnel remain a possibility.

Link to tweet

Columbia Pike Metro Expansion Nixed For Now

Jo DeVoe September 8, 2021 at 3:55pm

It looks like the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority is not going to consider a Metro line through Columbia Pike any time soon.

For the last year and a half, there were some signs that such an expansion — which was part of initial Metro planning in the 1960s but was never built — was an actual possibility.

In December 2019, Metro mulled the idea for a Silver Line extension down Columbia Pike and up Route 7, connecting with the West Falls Church Station, as one of a handful of ways to address congestion in the Rosslyn Metro tunnel, system reliability and future ridership growth. News of President Biden’s $2 trillion infrastructure plan, which coincided with WMATA’s deliberations, further crystallized those hopes.

A new study posted this week, however, indicates this extension — which nearly 70% of ARLnow readers supported in an April poll — has been ruled out. That follows a cost-benefit analysis by planners, which favored four other routes — each starting with a second Metro station in Rosslyn and adding an underground Metro station in Georgetown — as well as two options that don’t involve new construction.

{snip}

Metrobus route NH2 used to run from Huntington to the Oxon Hill Park and Ride lot, but that ended with the August 2020 timetable. Now the service goes directly from King Street-Old Town across the river to the park and ride lot. The proposed Blue Line would go from Huntington across the Woodrow Wilson Bridge to National Harbor and then the park and ride lot. From then it would head north into DC, while remaining separate from the Green Line.

An additional way to access Navy Yard-Ballpark would lighten the load on game days between L'Enfant Plaza and the ball park.

The Blue and Yellow Lines would swap routes south of King Street-Old Town