The Streetcar Cometh? Study Kicks Off This Week

• November 4, 2013

by Shilpi Paul

This week, the District Department of Transportation (DDOT) is holding a series of meetings throughout the city to kick off their efforts to study the North-South transit corridor, from SW DC to Silver Spring and Takoma Park.

DDOT hopes to make improvements to the corridor, which is roughly bound by 16th Street on the west and 5th Street to the east (see image above), and the study could eventually lead to the recommendation of a streetcar or Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) line on Georgia Avenue, 11th Street, 14th Street or 16th Street.

While Metro’s Red Line already runs through a portion of the area in focus, DDOT hopes to connect several destinations that are not easily accessible to each other, like the Walter Reed Campus, Howard University, the National Mall and the Southwest Waterfront. And though bus lines run throughout the District, DDOT wants to improve “surface transit” to make it faster and more reliable, with larger vehicles and perhaps transit signal priority, according to their flyer.

A post on Greater Greater Washington last week noted that the study will consider topics such as dedicated lanes, fewer stops versus frequent stops, and the construction and operating costs of BRT versus a streetcar.

The first of four meetings is tonight at 6:30pm at St. Augustine’s Episcopal Church at 600 M Street SW.

This article originally published at http://dc.urbanturf.com/articles/blog/ddot_kicks_off_north-south_corridor_and_potential_streetcar_study_this_week/7777