¶ Exploring Maryland's Purple Line Project
Doors are closing . Public transit that's my way to roll On the metro . I'm taking control . Bus stops , train tracks it's my daily grind , daily grind . Public transit it's the rhythm of my life . This week we dive into the Purple Line , the state of Maryland's plan to build a 16-mile light rail connecting several DC suburbs along the way .
Despite delays and cost overruns , the system is scheduled to open in 2027 . All of this and more coming up on Transit Tangents .
Hey everybody and welcome back to this episode of Transit Tangents . My name is Chris and I'm Lewis , and today we are looking at a system just outside of DC called the Purple Line .
Yeah , and we had the opportunity to actually travel to Washington DC about a week ago . It'll be a little bit more than that when this comes out , but we have more episodes coming on the topic , don't worry . But we also checked out some of the recent progress on the Purple Line .
Unfortunately , we were not able to put this project in our projects to look forward to in 2025 , but it is coming soon right now , slated to open in 2027 .
When we got out there , we were actually gonna do this episode on site at one of the stations that's currently being built . However , I think on that day it was- about 27 degrees and very windy and snow , blowing through Half a foot of snow , my hands were freezing off .
When we get to the Silver Spring Station section there'll be some actual B-roll that we took on the ground and I sacrificed my hands for you all so you can see it . But in general , the Purple Line for those of you not familiar is a 16 mile light rail that is going to be kind of the first real ring route around kind of outer DC .
It's actually in Maryland in its entirety . It is going to be kind of the first real ring route around uh kind of outer dc . It's actually in maryland in its entirety .
It's going to have 21 stations running from bethesda , maryland , to new carolton , um , and along the way it's going to interface with three different of the uh wmata , as we were hearing wmata wmata uh metro lines , uh connecting into DC , as well as three of the MARC commuter lines , an Amtrak section , as well as dozens of local and regional buses along the way .
Yeah , and this is really the first ring route that is connecting in DC . You don't see ring routes a lot in the US . We just frankly don't have the train networks built out to the extent that they're really needed or where they benefit Right . But we are starting to see some ring routes coming out . This is one of them . We've mentioned a couple times .
There's one in Dallas as well , called the Silver Line , not really a full ring route , but it is one that connects the airport to Plano , texas , so just a non-centralized line .
Totally , and they're very normal basically everywhere in the world that have a really reliable , frequent transit . So it's nice to start to see some of these happening here at home . But for the episode we're going to start by kind of jumping into the actual alignment of the route , starting in Bethesda .
So Bethesda is one of the many , many sort of suburban towns that exist outside of the city of DC , if anybody who has not been there . You have centralized DC and then you have Virginia and Maryland and there are tons of smaller cities all around it that are connected by buses , by trains et cetera .
Bethesda is one of the larger of these if you're heading out on the Red Line out of DC . Very built up area , sort of perfect for starting the line . Here there's a lot of bus connections the Red Line connection , I believe a Mark connection as well that passes through here , and now soon to be the Purple Line connection .
Totally , and it is one of the busiest stations , one of the busier suburban stations on the Metro . It sees right now about 5,000 to 6,000 riders a day and trending up . Before COVID it was actually seeing 10,000 riders a day on the Metro , so definitely some good potential interface with the Purple Line .
Yeah absolutely From Bethesda . The line is going to move east through more of a residential suburban area . Out of Bethesda it's going to go to Chevy Chase , littonsville . Littonsville are a little less dense , but there's a lot of opportunity for more transit-oriented development to pop up around these stations , providing more houses and more ridership .
Totally , and as we have the quick cameo from Chris's cat Otto here moving along , the next major station on the line is going to be Silver Springs . So Bethesda and now Silver Springs are kind of the two big ones and we have a few smaller ones that we've seen in between so far . Presently at Silver Springs the Metro sees about six to 7,000 riders a day .
So another really popular , kind of more suburban station along the line , Silver Springs . We actually got to go check out in person . It is a major bus terminal , Number one , Huge bus terminal , yeah , multi-level .
There were tons of buses coming in and out Private companies , public buses , all kinds of buses Totally .
In addition to that , the Mark trains run there seemingly only on the weekdays , but there is some Mark train ridership . Also , this station is so built up all around it . This is like textbook transit-oriented development . You had lots of mixed-use , lots of apartments , a lot of offices as well and there were quite a few people .
Actually it was a gross cold day out and there were quite a few people out and about . We actually went and got breakfast in this area . Very busy and , yeah , I mean overall very well interconnected into the region .
Yeah , and it was interesting to see how the Purple Line is being added into this development that's already there . There's a big flyover bridge coming off of the right-of-way where you see the Red Line and the Mark Line coming through .
This sort of flyover bridge has a station on the opposite side of the development and then it kind of ended and so we were looking at this saying there's buildings all around us . Where the hell is this train going to go ? Turns out it makes a kind of sharp turn through a parking garage and then onto the main street in this area .
It was a really cool design to see .
Absolutely , and they're definitely spending real money . On this section we're going to talk about the financial elements of this , which the costs have gone up , surprise , surprise , as the developments continued .
But yeah , I mean this is like a real big infrastructure project going through Silver Springs to interconnect the Purple Line and integrate it really well with the existing service in the area . We saw some pedestrian bridges under construction .
Bike share , bike share .
Bike lockers . Bike lockers , which was nice to see , so if you wanted to bike in and have a secure place to leave your bike all day . Really , it seemed like they're doing a lot of things really well at Silver Spring .
Yeah , I agree , from Silver Spring we had kind of one more dense station at the Silver Springs library , so not right at the transit center anymore but at the library , which again has a lot of the same benefits with the density and the transit oriented development at the station , before kind of moving off to a few more suburban stops next .
Continuing east and out of Silver Spring . We're going to skip a few of the smaller stations . Again , these are more residential suburban areas . The Purple Line is going to continue over to the Tacoma Langley Station area .
In Langley it's actually really interesting to look at the path of the train because they're using a really creative mix of sort of new right-of-way , existing rail right-of-way and in this case they're sort of transitioning back to the main roads and using the road right-of-way .
So we see the purple line coming down the middle of sort of the main street in this area and passing by the bus terminal in Langley . So , again , another good use of transit-oriented development and connecting riders from the local bus system to this line .
And then it continues on through the Tacoma area where there's a lot of the sort of strip mall developments that you expect to see in . You know , a modern America , american suburbia , tons of surface parking and , as you would say , where you see surface parking I see potential .
Yeah , maybe coming to a t-shirt available to you soon , maybe , yeah , yeah , it's just like really classic . Maybe coming to a t-shirt available to you soon , maybe , yeah .
It's just really classic . I mean right now , not the best land use to have surrounding these stations . However , if you redevelop it into some nice mixed use , keep the commercial that's there but build apartments as well , and , yeah , I think it could really help boost ridership .
And when you already have that bus terminal there too , this area to me stood out as an area that has a lot of potential for future ridership Maybe not so much to start , but down the line , definitely . Yeah , absolutely . We'll jump right back into the episode in just a second , but first , if you haven't liked this video or left a comment , please do so .
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Lastly , if you want to support the show directly and get access to early episodes , you can do so on Patreon . But without further ado let's jump right back into the episode Next , along the line we have four stops that serve the University of Maryland area , and it literally goes right down the middle of the campus , which is exactly where it should go .
For folks not familiar , the University of Maryland has a student population of over 40,000 students Pretty sizable university Totally .
And then when you add on to this , there's an additional 15,000 faculty and staff who work at the university , so potential ridership of almost 60,000 people just when you're counting students and staff , not counting any visitors and other business and whatnot that happens surrounding the area . To me this is a major win to have it in the system .
Currently , the university is only kind of sort of served by the metro lines at college park green line that comes up through college park right , and it's presently like a bus ride or a long walk that most people probably weren't going to do , whereas now it will be an easy hop on to the purple line to connect you right to the green line .
I'd imagine too that there's probably a lot of students who live in suburban Maryland who go too , that there's probably a lot of students who live in suburban Maryland who go here .
So there's also just a lot of potential for commuters from Bethesda , from Silver Springs and several of the other places , even the more suburban stops all along the line to use this to commute into the university every day , which is just a major win .
And the other thing I'll mention here is college students generally don't like to have a car in a lot of cases , I would say , if they don't have to .
Don't like it or can't afford it .
Or can't afford it exactly , and this is a great way to , regardless of their situation , introduce them to good transit before they become very car-pilled and decide they want to have cars everywhere always . I love that I used pilled right there , become very car-pilled and decide they want to have cars everywhere always .
I love that . I used to pill right there . Even if you can't afford a car and you do typically drive your vehicle onto campus , this is also a good opportunity to leave the vehicle at home because , as any college student can tell you , parking fees on campuses really high , totally , really annoying . Yes , absolutely .
Continuing east , past the college , we end up in more suburban residential areas . I think that's going to be a theme for a lot of this line . A lot of these areas fall into sort of weird areas with topography a lot of like watersheds and kind of woodsy areas .
A lot of residential neighborhoods that you're sort of winding the road around Again , finding that creative path using the road right of way . Neighborhoods that you're sort of winding the road around again , finding that creative path using the road right-of-way anywhere that you can .
¶ Analyzing Maryland's Purple Line Efficiency
But what we really notice on this last stretch between the University of Maryland and New Carrollton , which is the terminus of the line , is that there's not a ton of availability to develop a lot of transit-oriented developments .
Right , there are a couple of strip mall , shopping center areas that we identified on the map that the rail line goes through , that have potential , but we're thinking this is probably going to be a lower ridership part of the line .
Right , yeah , and I mean there was one thing that just stood out to me when we were scrolling through . I mean there is a grocery store near one of the stops which and I think there were some in some of the earlier suburban ones .
So obviously having access to a grocery store on a transit line always going to be helpful for folks so like to see that sort of thing .
But yeah , um , unlike some of the other stations , less room to uh for development here , or less room for development with , like out , a huge ordeal of like relocating single family homes and all that sort of thing which folks are not going to let happen . Basically , I would imagine .
They did find some space to put the OMF here , though , which is the operations and maintenance facility , so the OMF is also tucked away in this line and , as you kind of called out , off camera . That's probably why the line started here was because they found some cheap , or at least good , land to build this facility .
Totally . And this kind of brings us to our last stop on this line , which is New Carrollton . So you know , maybe there'll be some decent ridership because of this last stop here . So New Carrollton is currently the end of the Orange line for the DC Metro . There is some transit-oriented development being built here right now . There's some stuff that's open already .
So obviously , the potential interface with the Orange Line only a good thing . The transit-oriented development happening here only a good thing . This is also where DC Metro has a big operations facility .
They store a lot of their trains in New Carrollton and also New Carrollton has a stop on the Amtrak as well and presently sees about 4,000 riders per day on the metro line .
So another good place for a lot of transit transfers and a lot of ridership generated . Maybe in New Carrollton We'll see if it extends down the Purple Line .
I'm really curious to see what the ridership is ultimately going to look like and where the main destinations that people are traveling to , where they're mostly getting on Obviously , like you know , the main ones that we pointed out Bethesda , silver Springs , new Carrollton and the whole university area , usdot and some of the studies on this they're expecting somewhere in
the realm of 56,000 weekday trips on it , like every weekday they're expecting roughly 56,000 riders . But it's also one of those things that I'm curious yeah , how long those rides are going to be , if there are going to be sections of this that don't see it when we look at some of the travel times on it .
It's not all doom and gloom , but it's a little funny . Yeah , I do wonder , with some of the travel times , how people are going to perceive this .
So , for instance , if you're going to take a bus on the length of this line , which nobody's really doing nobody's really taking a bus from New Carrollton to Bethesda , but if you were to do it today it would take about 92 minutes total time city to city .
That number is only going to go up over time , especially as there's more people in the area , more development , more traffic . So by 2040 , they're actually estimating that commute to be 108 minutes long , so definitely growing .
If you were to take Metro Rail currently , which would be taking the red line all the way down to DC , transferring to the green or orange sorry , to the orange and then taking the orange back up , it'll take you about 55 minutes and the projected amount of time on the purple line right now is 63 minutes , Right ?
So meaning it's actually faster to take the DC Metro in and then back out than it would be to take the Purple Line end to end . But it's a lot better for the less distant spots , right ? So if you're you know , a more realistic example of where someone might be traveling and using the Purple Line would be going from Bethesda to Silver Springs .
So in 24 or 2030 , the estimated time by bus would be 40 minutes . The Purple Line is projected to take 10 .
So on some of the destinations that probably are going to be more likely , you're likely going to see travel time saved , but on some of the more distant ones , it's not great , and a lot of that has to do with this being light rail and not being in dedicated right of way the whole time . There's a lot of weaving in and out of traffic .
There are some sections that are elevated or have real dedicated space , but yeah , that's a long distance travel . So of course you'll see the Metro , which has got grade separation the entire way . Not interfacing with traffic at all is going to beat it .
Yeah , you have to think about how traffic patterns work and we talk about this a lot that people have a bias against buses .
So if you're going to try to get somebody to go from one of these suburban towns into DC not using their car , it may be an easier sell , even if it's a little bit longer to take the train , almost like a circulator , like a bus circulator would be . Take it to the nearest metro line . That's going to then get you into central DC .
I think that's going to collect a lot of commuters . Would it be quicker by bus ? Probably so , but can you get people over their bias of buses ? I don't know .
Right , yeah , and I mean overall , I think this is a good project that needs to be done . There are some complaints that folks have about it , though , so we'll kind of transition here into talking about the cost issues that we've seen so far .
Yeah , it's been nicknamed the most expensive not nicknamed , I guess , but described as the most expensive light rail project by mile in the world .
Yeah , not great . Not great . It was initially expected to cost just over five billion dollars and now we are very close to doubling it at $10 billion . So not great .
I'm going to read a direct quote here that just kind of gives a little bit of insight here , from a Maryland Matters article Nearly seven years after construction began , transit authorities returned to the Board of Public Works yet again this month , this time seeking an additional $425 million for the light rail project .
It was the fourth such request since 2016 to supplement the Purple Line's original $5.6 billion budget . Following the three member boards' unanimous but reluctant approval , the total cost of the Purple Line is now approaching $10 billion . So , you know , four times in just the last few years they've gone back to ask for more money .
So it's like it's tricky because obviously , like costs have gone up since COVID right , obviously everywhere . But it also seems like , if you're going back four separate times to ask for more money , there's also and I don't know for sure , right , but it also just seems like there's some some incompetence or something .
Sure , right , but it also just seems like there's some some incompetence or something going on where it's like you had to continue to go back and ask for money , like adjust the budget . Adjust the budget , that's fine , but adjusting the budget four times in like a couple years feels inefficiencies in government spending on building transit systems .
I just I've never heard of that .
It doesn't have to be this way , it doesn't have to be that way and this .
This would go into a whole other episode that we could do and which we should do just breaking down exact costs of transit systems . But yeah , this is a an old story in the us . Anytime you're going to try to build a new transit system , it's almost always over budget and takes a little more time than you would expect . It doesn't have to be that way .
There's a lot of reasons , a lot of ways we could make this more efficient . There's a lot of reasons why it is the way it is now , but this is sort of the reality of this transit system Right , and it is being built under a private-public partnership model , also known as a P3 .
It's a whole other conversation we could have . Rm Transit did a really great video just explaining P3s and the pros and cons to them , which we'll leave a link to below if you're interested in diving into that .
And they can be really good for the public . I mean , if you're trying to offset some of the costs , you give some of this project to a private company , they get to recoup those costs , whether it's by fares or other methods . That's all fine and good , but then your local government has limited control over the system . Totally so definitely .
If you're summarizing pros and cons , that's kind of that's a lot of it
¶ Connecting Regional Transit Networks Efficiently
right .
one other thing I want to touch on on the purple line too is the purple line is a transit project in Maryland .
It will have a different fare system than the rest of the kind of WMATA system , from what I understand at least , and while it's not the biggest deal in the world , there are a lot of transit systems , especially in the United States , that deal with this , like even New York City comes to mind .
If you're coming from New Jersey , you know , on a PATH train or something like , you're buying a fare for the PATH train and then you're buying another fare for the MTA , for the subway and whatnot . So you know it works , but it's not as convenient as you'd like it to be necessarily .
And in this day and age we can track riders so easily . We can transfer the money from fares pretty easily across state lines . It really doesn't make sense for it to be as difficult as it is . So it is a little disappointing that they're not already talking about integrating into this payment system .
But , as you said , you look at New York and it's kind of a similar issue , kind of anywhere you go .
And it's something that in the future could be fixed pretty easily too . So it's not all doom and gloom .
If I can use a toll transponder to drive on a highway in Texas and have that same toll transponder work in Colorado Right ?
Yeah , we should be able to use a train between two states , right , we do it for car drivers , we should do it for transit , right , exactly .
So that is the summary of the Purple Line as it exists today and what will open in twenty , twenty seven , hopefully , hopefully , at fifteen billion dollars .
No , no , no no more . 10 billion we got .
We got it at 10 but this is really just one segment of a much larger project that's going to connect not only maryland but also connect into virginia , back around to dc , and the idea is that you are making a true ring route .
I know we've been calling it a ring route and this is only like one little section of it yeah , and there are a lot of uh , good potential places , similar to Bethesda and Silver Springs and New Carrollton , that already have development built up , that this could continue to help connect , continue to interface with existing transit lines along the way , and it would
make a lot of sense . And it's something that again , as we kind of briefly touched on at the beginning of the episode , is super normal in the rest of the world . Yes , not so much in the US .
And you know , like when a lot of our transit systems were being built in the US , there was a lot more direct like , yeah , you went to downtown , you go to downtown to go out to eat and to shop and to work specifically to work in a lot of cases and you have a transit system set up for a morning commute and an evening commute .
But that's just not how things work anymore . And it was kind of , you know , especially after COVID , with so many people working from home . Sure , you have a lot more people returning to the office and whatnot now , but there's also a lot of office development in a lot of these further out suburbs .
There's a lot of other destinations throughout and people are not only just traveling at eight in the morning and at 5 pm at night . They're traveling more spread out throughout the day and projects like the Purple Line , in my opinion , really start to address that .
Yeah , I think so too , and this is sort of a consequence of the sort of uninhibited urban sprawl that we've created in the US . Similar in other countries too . You have this urban sprawl . You have these other little town centers . It's a different mindset on why they connect them and how they connect them with their ring routes and their larger transit networks .
But here in the US we have a problem with urban sprawl . We have a problem with suburbia , and a lot of suburban areas are starting to densify . They're getting these offices , they're being their own economic engines .
Now we have to provide mobility for these towns and if we're going to have this sprawl , we're going to have to find a way to connect them and it can't be that all of the traffic has to go into a centralized downtown area , especially because most people don't want to do that .
It's going to be better for the environment and better for these towns if we can find a more efficient way to move people from these sort of suburbs around the ring to each other . Totally , that doesn't involve driving .
Yeah , um , with that , that's a whole lot on the purple line . Um , hopefully we can get back to the area post 2027 to go , uh , take a ride on the purple line , maybe not the full distance and also maybe in the summer and maybe in the spring .
Yeah , yeah yeah , the joke I kept making the entire time we were in dc was I was I was suggesting we should go to Phoenix and it would have been about 80 degrees and sunny in Phoenix and instead it was snowing and cold and windy . But it's okay .
We had a lovely time . We did have a lovely time .
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Yep , and more to come there . Hopefully We'll see . If you've got requests , let us know Without any further ado , though , thank you all so much for watching and enjoy the rest of your transit . Tangents Tuesday .