Georgetown Gondola Study Could Be Underway in 2015

• March 6, 2015

by UrbanTurf Staff

A rendering of the gondola. Georgetown BID.

One of the more ambitious transportation projects announced in DC over the last 18 months is the plan to connect Georgetown and Rosslyn via an aerial gondola. However, before that plan gets moving, the Georgetown Business Improvement District (BID) needs to figure out how a formal feasibility study of the gondola will be financed.

“The requests for modest funding and participation from both Arlington County and the DC government are pending,” BID CEO Joe Sternlieb wrote to UrbanTurf this week. “The government transitions have put new folks in place on both sides of the river and we anticipate that they may take some time with the gondola issue as there are many important issues on their plates that require immediate attention before this does.”

As of last November, the feasibility study had raised 65 percent of the necessary funding from private donors. Sternlieb stated that he is “very optimistic” that the study will be underway this year.

UrbanTurf’s streetcar-inspired rendering of the gondola, by Capital Pixel

Once the remaining funding is secured, the group can move forward with soliciting bids from companies who would conduct the study. In addition to the usual engineering challenges, the study will need to include input from organizations like the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), since helicopters regularly fly along the river.

The gondola project is easily the boldest of the plans outlined in the Georgetown 2028 project, a set of 75 action items the neighborhood would like to see implemented over the next 15 years, most of which relate to transportation improvements.

This article originally published at http://dc.urbanturf.com/articles/blog/study_on_georgetown_gondola_hopes_to_be_funded_by_end_of_year/9612