Metrorail is the
backbone of Washington DC’s transit system. It was opened in 1976
and consists of six lines which spread out from DC into Maryland and
Virginia. Metrorail was the impetus for the creation of WMATA. In the
mid 1960s, when the DC region was finally committed to the idea of a
mass transit system, it was decided that the effort needed to be
coordinated by one single agency and not the many private transit
agencies serving DC, Maryland, and Northern Virginia at the time.
The Current Metrorail Map
Originally, WMATA
was created with the purpose of constructing and running the rail
system only, leaving bus service to the private companies and
counties that then operated it. This vision was changed as
construction of the rail system was delayed longer than anticipated.
The first line of
Metrorail to be constructed was the Red Line. This initial segment
went from Rhode Island Avenue to Farragut North, and was extended in
both directions to Shady Grove and Glenmont. This line also has the
heaviest usage, and is a direct link from Union Station to downtown.
The combination of these two things, naturally, mean that the Red
Line also has a large number of maintenance and service issues.
Fires, floods, train delays, and single tracking are all well known
to Red Line riders, and it can seem like every day is a new adventure
headache.
The second line to
be opened was the Blue Line. Initially, it travelled from National
Airport to Stadium-Armory, and was then extended from
Franconia-Springfield to Largo Town Center. This line had the longest
frequencies of any Metrorail line until recently, and because of this
has low ridership despite offering a one seat ride from Northern
Virginia to downtown.
The third line to
open was the Orange Line, running from Ballston-MU to New Carrolton,
later extended west to Vienna-Fairfax GMU. This was the second line
into Northern Virginia, and connects the I-66 corridor with downtown
DC. This line also formed the Rosslyn-Ballston corridor, an area of
dense transit oriented development linking five Metrorail stations in
Arlington County. This corridor has served as a model of transit
oriented development throughout the country.
The fourth line to
open was the Yellow Line. This line originally ran from National
Airport to Gallery Place-Chinatown, and was later extended from
Huntington to Fort Totten. It serves to bypass several stops in
Northern Virginia to connect directly with downtown DC. WMATA offered
“Rush Plus” service on the Yellow Line for several years, in
which several Yellow Line trains ran to Franconia-Springfield instead
of Huntington, utilizing excess capacity on this segment of the Blue
Line.
The fifth line to
open, completing the original Metrorail system, was the Green Line.
The Green Line was promised to connect Washington’s two
historically African American communities, U Street and Anacostia,
allowing the economic development rought by Metrorail to benefit
these neighborhoods, despite struggles during the construction
process. The Green Line was constructed in two phases, the first
being from U Street-Cardozo to Anacostia, and the second being from
Fort Totten to Greenbelt. During a period of six months, several
Green Line trains were routed over the Red Line to connect these two
segments, known as the “commuter shortcut”. This ended in 1999
when the middle portion of the line opened.
The sixth and most
recent line to open was the phase one of the Silver Line, travelling
from Wiehle-Reston East to Largo Town Center. The Silver Line will be
Metrorail’s longest line when completed, running from Route 772 in
Ashburn to Largo Town Center, connecting downtown DC with Dulles
Airport. The first phase of this line also serves Tysons, with four
stations located in the city. Tysons is undergoing a rebirth as a
transit oriented urban center in conjunction with Metrorail. This
line will also serve the town of Reston, a planned urbanist community
constructed in the 1960s.
WMATA currently
operates two types of railcars. Broadly, these are the legacy trains
and the new trains. Legacy trains consist of the 1000, 2000, 3000,
4000, 5000, and 6000 series of cars. These cars are made out of
extruded aluminum and feature a wide brown stripe along the side
windows, and are mostly indistinguishable from one another. Due to
safety and reliability issues, WMATA is retiring the 1000 series and
the 4000 series, the 1000 series cars being the original Metrorail
vehicles. The legacy cars feature large windows, carpeting, and
padded seats in either a red/blue or tan/orange color scheme. In
many of the 6000 series cars, the carpeting has been replaced with
hard flooring as a test of flooring materials for the new trains. The
legacy trains also feature WMATA’s iconic “Doors opening, step
back to allow customers to exit. When boarding, please move to the
center of the car” announcements, although each train operator must
call out stations manually, in a manner such as
“reylinetrainshaygrow”.
The legacy train cars
The new trains
consist of the 7000 series. These cars are built out of corrugated
stainless steel and feature automated station announcements,
resilient flooring, better interior lighting, and real time route
maps. The station announcements are occasionally temperamental, and
often mispronounce names or speaklikethis. The new trains also have
eight fewer longitudinal seats, a loss that’s common on public
transit and one which I bemoan because I enjoy looking out the window
while riding. While the seats are padded, they feature slightly less
padding than those of the legacy trains.
The new train cars
Recently, Metrorail
has finished its Safetrack maintenance blitz. This followed years of
safety lapses and deferred maintenance, and consisted of shutting
down or single tracking line segments for weeks at a time to rebuild
track and stations, and making parts of the system all but unusable
to commuters. I am of the opinion that WMATA did not go far enough in
providing supplemental bus service or conducting quality control of
the repairs. After Safetrack, WMATA began a plan of “right sizing”
Metrorail service, which resulted in reducing peak frequencies and
shortening operating hours to some of the most limited in the
country. Many riders and transit bloggers are afraid that this will
trigger a “death spiral” and only make the system’s problems
worse.
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