So, the US Actually *Can* Design Great Transit | Washington Metro
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- Опубліковано 16 гру 2022
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The Washington Metro has a special place in my heart, with its grand architecture, large trains, and impressive city centre tunnels - even when it isn't by any means perfect. Learn more about the system in today's video!
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Ever wondered why your city's transit just doesn't seem quite up to snuff? RMTransit is here to answer that, and help you open your eyes to all of the different public transportation systems around the world!
Reece (the RM in RMTransit) is an urbanist and public transport critic residing in Toronto, Canada, with the goal of helping the world become more connected through metros, trams, buses, high-speed trains, and all other transport modes.
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I wish more cities would run their metros directly to their airports, and not just connect them via monorails or people movers or other silly things.
Will the new purple line have the same unique station architecture as the rest of the system?
Though I live in New York, I've only been to DC once as a kid a long time ago, but I do remember the strange architecture of the underground stations in the city center.
Can’t believe that you are now part of nebula! Hope it works great for you 😊
T.O.D. has really gained a lot of support in the DC area in the last 20 years. However, there were decades of development where suburbs were built on farmland and existing roads were widened to handle increased traffic. Not "Smart Growth" by any stretch of imagination.
What you didn't mention are the "rules" of the DC metro. Absolutely no eating or drinking (results in no mice or rats, unlike NYC). Always stand to the right of the escalator. Yes, people who are walking up the escalator will tell you to move. When outside the train, waiting for the doors to open, never stand directly in front of the doors. The DC metro is clean, easy to navigate, and rarely gets clogged with masses of people because everyone follows the rules and if you don't, a local will tell you.
Omfg you cant eat......thats not that bad like why walk and eat like bruv
Aren’t those rules in place in pretty much all metro systems?
@@angryakita3870 Eating is usually allowed I think. The rest are more guidelines.
@@leonpaelinck eating/drinking is the only written rule that I know of for the DC metro, whether or not it's actually strictly enforced. Not blocking the doors is also something often said over the intercom, but I believe the escalator behavior developed entirely organically on its own.
I dont eat on Metro but i do allow myself to drink water. But yeah generally dc metro is pretty tame
The DC Metro is basically how kid me thought the future would look like. Those stations truly are the Michelangelo of Brutalism. Absolutely jawdropping. Whoever designed the lighting was clearly an artist.
It's even cooler inside. Some of the escalators are so scary but cool. It feel like being processed in a futuristic, sci fi future just walking through some of them.
Harry Weese was the Architect
I completely agree. I’ve always loved the lighting in the DC Metro. Together with the acoustic properties of the waffle structures, they have a serenity to them.
I feel bad because I hate it, it's needlessly dark and cavernous and makes the trains sound even louder than they are. I would be much happier with a brightly-lit, London Tube-like design. But I'm glad some people can find beauty in it.
Yes the lighting somehow makes the stations feel cozy, even though they are built in a style that I think is opposite to coziness.
The metro was build to bring in people living in Maryland and Virginia to DC, but not to be an inner city transit like NYC. It was made to gap huge distance and let people live further and so they can pack as much government as they can in this area.
Tbh, this is the identity of the DC Metro and why it was built. It's also why I dislike it since it encouraged sprawl and it was a bad bet in the modern age. With remote work, even people in government are not going to tolerate the bad delays of commuting with the Metro if they live far out or with 1-2 hour car commutes. It's going to need a new identity if it wants to be viable in the future (tbf, NYC also has some of these problems but I think it's better positioned to solve them than DC is).
It was also always built as a way to get the many tourists in and around all the museums and government offices without needing a car. It's had a dual purpose. That's why the Fed Govt is one of the 4 main funding sources and a part of the interstate compact.
@@machtmann2881 I get it
@@bjdon99 yeah, but bus would better. DC isn't big enough for the system that it needs for its size
@@machtmann2881seems a lot better than Philly’s Transit. Zepta makes you want to drive 😂
Been waiting for this one! The system I ride every day. We grumble about the Metro but it's hard to imagine the DC area without it. This system really drove a lot of redevelopment in several neighborhoods (such as the Orange Line through Northern VA, the NoMa station on the Red Line), and the brutalist underground systems are really striking.
I hope it was worth the wait!
I live near Eisenhower, it’s crazy the buildup they did around this area
I just moved to clerendon and the metro is so easy and convenient that i barely use my car
The thing that gets me is that back in the late '80s and '90s, we were pretty proud of the Metro. Maybe that bit us in the ass in the end, as WMATA kept saying the system was so new it didn't need the maintenance/inspection (LOL).
The Metro didn't necessarily *drive* development, incidentally. North Arlington had the Metro for a while. But it wasn't until the late '90s that the county government here really leaned into concentrating along the Orange Line corridor. The success in Rosslyn/Clarendon/Ballston was impossible without Metro...but the Metro came before the will to use it in that way.
I am very happy now that the silver line is finished!
As a student at UMD in College Park on the yellow/green line, I cam say from experience that the lack of ring lines gets annoying fast, if I want to get to the NEC my best option is to go all the way into union station instead of the much shorter distance to New Carrollton, the purple line is such an important expansion in my opinion
*Sad F6 / F4 / 126 noises*
Agreed. Growing up north of Silver Spring, it was funny to me how the two red line ends and green were so close. I really hope that we get the Purple Line but don't stop there. The purple line or equivalent should really be a circumferential alternative to the beltway. And we need a couple more crisscrossing lines connecting the spokes in the metro.
@@jg-7780 the F6 runs through campus as well, but it somehow takes 20-30 minutes to get from College Park to New Carrollton, it's also so infrequent at any time I would need it(mostly weekends or very early morning) so as to be basically unusable
@@haxorouse3265 Fair enough. I find its speed to be fine (certainly faster than taking the metro into Union and MARC back out) but the schedule can suck ass depending on when you need to travel. If possible, I like to bike to Riverdale and catch the much more frequent F4 but the logistics of the bike sometimes prevent that.
@Haxorouse I live in south Arlington, and I have to take a 25-minute bus and two trains to get just to Union Station. I'd kill to have just a 20-30 minute bus ride to New Carrollton, even if it was infrequent.
I have taken friends from other countries on the DC metro, and several found it strange that many outlying stations can’t be reached on foot or bike, as they are just enormous parking lots encircled by 5 lane highways. It seemed odd to them that you had to do a driving commute, pay for parking and walk 10 minutes through the lot….just to start your subway commute. It is a pretty decent system otherwise.
I think it makes sense for this area, considering that you really do need access to a car if you want to live in the DC suburbs. Yes, busses are technically an option but they fail for most practical uses.
As ZachW said, it makes sense for the area. If you live in (for example) Charles County and your closest station is Branch Avenue, the only practical way for you to get to Branch Avenue is by car. Charles County is very car dependent county. So much so that car-less kid-me would walk along the freight train tracks because it was far safer than walking beside the busy streets/roads with zero sidewalks, lol.
(I’m obviously describing my past situation as a former Charles County resident.)
@@zachw566usually a 20 min drive is more than a 1.5 hour bus ride
@@suntanironmanThere is a plan for a light rail line from Branch Avenue to Waldorf in Charles County, so there is hope
I just took the metro today from NW DC to Dulles. While it takes longer than driving, it only cost $2 which is amazing! This is my first time flying out of Dulles. Before the silver line extension, I’d never even remotely considered it due to transportation costs.
only 2$ thats surpising
@@sammymarrco2 the late night and weekend fare is $2 system wide
Have you ever taken it back from Dulles yet? I haven't used the new extension since it opened but the bus to Whiele-Reston Silver line station was lackluster and it was still another 20+ minutes before the train came to the stop. Still cheaper than a $100 Uber ride at peak times if you have time to spare though.
@@machtmann2881 I haven’t, yesterday was my first time at Dulles ever
@@sammymarrco2 fare during peak hours is capped at $6, too
As a big cyclist in the area, one of the hidden gems of the new silver line through the Reston area is the W&OD trail running parallel. Its a really cool feeling knowing that if the weather gets unexpectedly bad or if its getting dark you can just bike to one of the stations and get home from there.
Also good mention on that long stretch between some of those silver line stations. I've read that they are considering adding an infill station for the Wolf Trap performing arts center sometime in the future.
I personally wish the W&OD never got rid of their track so that we could've had another VRE line that runs parallel to route 7. Having that eventually go to Winchester would've been perfect for alleviating traffic but alas the ones in charge back then couldn't see that far into the future. I wouldn't mind if at some point in the future the W&OD becomes a light rail corridor while also keeping the trail everyone has come to love
@@failsrus96 yes, but w&od is so busy in some parts of Fairfax/FC/Arlington/Alexandria that it could use an extra lane or two as a trail
@@hobog we also would need better protected bike lanes
@@failsrus96 personally a mainline rail and trail would be amazing, as well as grade separation.
Man you just convinced me to move near the silver line. (I work near there, just needed a good reason to settle.)
I have been waiting for this video for a long time. Automatic Train Control should be coming back shortly which will greatly optimize the system. New GM has done a lot of great things.
Fingers crossed!
I'm sorry but what exactly is "automatic train control"?
@@josephj.6478 In the Before Time, which is to say before the 2009 Fort Totten accident, Metro train operators didn't do anything except close the doors at stations, make announcements (before they were automated), and monitor the trackway for hazards. ATC (technically, Automatic Train Operation -- ATO) actually drove the trains, stopped at stations, and opened the doors.
@@tkynerd oh wow, that's neat!
I agree! So far can't say enough good things about GM Randy Clarke.
I moved to DC last year and the Metro has become one of my all-time favorite systems in the world. It's far from perfect but the history of this system is incredibly fascinating and the fact that it built 129 miles of track/98 stations (including Potomac Yard assuming that is finished soon) in around 46 years is so impressive. I strongly recommend reading The Great Society Subway by Zachary M. Schrag if you want to learn more about what went into making this system, it's THE quintessential Metro history book. I happened to be on one of the first trains for the Silver Line Extension. Riding from end to end, from Downtown Largo to Ashburn, and getting to witness the Metro expand in real time is genuinely a wonder to behold. You're right Reece, this system has such a bright future ahead of it and I can't wait to see what happens next. As they say, "Step back, doors closing!"
thanks for the suggestion
I cant say step back doors closing in my head without that girls voice lol
@@safeinsound432 lmao. Don’t forget the little chime.
129 miles of track over the course of 46 years is not the definition of impressive... I mean I find the metro to be among the more intelligently designed systems in the US, and am happy to have grown near it... But having lived in Korea really changed my perspective on what was impressive infrastructure development.
@@jovegajo my experience as well. Not comparable to foreign top notch systems, not even close
As someone that grew up in DC's MD suburbs (near Largo Town Center) and moved to the city of Baltimore as an adult, I've always wondered what Baltimore could have become had it followed DC's lead and allocated some of its interstate highway dollars towards building a proper metro system. Baltimore used to be a much larger, denser, more populous city than DC before its decades of rapid population decline. Now DC proper has over 100k more residents than Baltimore and almost 2.5x its metropolitan population. I don't think DC grows into the metropolis it becomes without a proper transit system. Imo this is where Baltimore failed.
In a city where 45% of the working population does not currently own a vehicle, the city's survival was and IS wholly dependent on its ability to freely move its residents from their homes to their jobs, schools, and retail with relative ease. It was the lack of this foresight some 50 yrs ago that imo has led to the rapid decline of the city of Baltimore.
Anybody that is familiar with the Mid-Atlantic Region knows that Baltimore and Philadelphia are essentially the exact same city. Philly is the big bro to Bmore. The only difference is that Philly has the SEPTA as its backbone. This is why imo Philly's population has remained relatively stable in the past half-century whereas Bmore is on life support. Proper transit is everything!!!!
The same is true for Detroit and Chicago. Two incredibly similar yet different cities, one with good transit, the other without
This is the metro system I grew up with, as a kid in the Virginia suburbs--I remember well when it first opened, and the extreme ambition of announcing the complete plan for most of the current system (except for the Silver Line) when only a few stations on the Red Line yet existed. The first maps already showed the entire 101-mile planned system with its five lines (very close to what was eventually built with only a few deviations), but with nearly all of it drawn as hashed lines indicating future expansion. You just don't see anything on that level being planned in the US these days. In the 1970s it seemed wildly hypermodern and futuristic, though I remember the fare-collection system having a lot of bugs in the early years.
Lately, it seems like most of the news about this system has been dire and it's treated as an ongoing calamity, and it's heartbreaking.
(I misremembered: the very *earliest* maps from 1976-77 didn't even hash the nonexistent lines; they just left the future stations as empty white circles! It looked at first glance as if the whole system already existed, not just a central snippet of the Red Line.)
Great story! I just moved to DC, but I love trains and metro systems, and I’m in specially in love with the DC Metro. A good part of that calamity is how fare evasion is treated like nothing. People who aren’t supposed to be on the trains are causing some of the biggest problems. That and bureaucracy.
As a lifelong Jersey resident, I was so used to the NYC Subway method of 1 token=1 ride anywhere, i was shocked to see the "Addfare" machines in DC metro. You mean I have to pay to get out, too?
@@johnclement5903you're not really "paying twice" to get out there's just a different fare depending on what station you get off at
My main gripe while living in DC was the very poor headway, frequently north of 20 minutes off-peak. Could be easily improved
The purple line and a line through Georgetown would basically make it perfect. They definitely need another bridge across the Potomac
George town is super hard to have a station due to it's location and proximity to the soft ground of the river.
I'm a New Yorker who lived in NoVA for a while. I took (IIRC) a Fairfax bus to work in Reston. I remember thinking at the time that the DC Metro kind of didn't know what it was. Was it commuter rail? Was it a subway? Now, I think that the fact that it's more like the one the further out you go and more like the other when you get further in can be a strength. Transferring between systems here in NYC can be a bit of a pain! And the DC Metro through-runs trains. Of course, DC Metro has all those issues with headways and ATC and reliability to figure out.
I would never call a system that operates as much service as DC does commuter rail :-) suburban rail yes!
Right now, WMATA is studying whether to bring back turnbacks on the Yellow line. This would mean that every other train would turn around at Fort Totten to increase frequency in the core, but also halve frequency north of Fort Totten.
I’m not sure if they’re studying it on other lines. I know they could bring back turnbacks on the Red line but that is politically fraught.
@@RMTransit So what do you consider Metra, Long Island Railroad, or MARC ?
@@pizzajona Yeah, they should do turnbacks at Ft. Totten on the Green/Yellow/Red lines. It makes so much sense.
Also a native New Yorker. Still living in DC. Metro is functionally useless to over 70% of the people who live in the region because it doesn't actually help you if you don't work in the city (and most of us don't). Door-to-door via Metro and buses it's 90 minutes each way. 25 minutes to drive. It's similarly useless on weekends due to the constrained operating hours, making it less useful to the workers who need it and the people who might have otherwise used it to go into the city for events (instead traffic in the city is worse on the weekends than it is on weekdays). This is wildly different from the NYC Subway, which is useful to getting around 3 of the 5 boroughs and to the bus terminals serving the other 2. I had friends who could and did commute to go to school in Manhattan from Queens. From Bayside to Midtown in a little over an hour compared to just under an hour if you drove (which you never would). DC (and WMATA) aren't confused about the city's identity. It's a driving city. Everyone who can afford to drives. The people who don't literally take helicopters.
Having been here in the DC area (DMV) for the past 10+ years, lived both in Bethesda and Silver Spring, AND studied at the University of Maryland... I can say from personal experience that the purple line will be one of the best things that have happened to this city in a very long time! I really wish that it already existed from the moment I landed here.
I lived in DC for 7 years and for much of that time I was using Metro daily to travel between my apartment in Dupont Circle and my job on the other side of the Potomac. I loved riding Metro at first, but over the years I developed a love hate relationship for Metro. I still loved the architecture and the fact I could somewhat easily live in the city without owning a vehicle, which was a great cost savings considering the cost of housing there. At the same time, I had too many instances where Metro had service malfunctions creating long delays and massive crowding which made me start to hate riding it. I was about as happy as it gets when I finally succeeded in landing a job within walking distance of my home and no longer had to rely on Metro to commute to work. Once I didn't have to deal with it on a daily basis, my hate subsided and my love gradually increased again.
This is the duality of metro. When its good, its easily among the best. But they have deep issues in the management culture that boil over in catastrophic ways. The whole time I’m watching this video wondering if he is going to bring up how were currently on month 15 of severely reduced service because they cant keep trains on the tracks. It’ll never get back to 2019 levels either because all the trains coming back have an extra 25 miles of silver line to cover just for 3 or 4 people to commute from ashburn to Tyson’s or the pentagon and not even enter the city. The airport connection is cool i guess but outside of Virginia its still faster and easier to get to bwi on the Marc.
If you drove it on a daily basis, you'd likely hate driving even more. Getting stuck in traffic every day is no fun.
@@esp1344 Yes to your BWI point, but I think there's a lot to be said for a 1 seat ride, even if it takes longer. Making a rail connection in DC underground is a lot easier imo than waiting for the shuttle bus at BWI station
@@esp1344its never among the best
Really great video! I lived in DC for a number of years and grew up in the region so I have a lot of love for the DC Metro.
The DC City Council just voted to make all buses within DC free for riders and also extend service to 24hr/day on 12 of the most frequently used lines, which I think will go a long way to increasing connectivity in the city and region.
In terms of airports in the DC region, I'd also definitely include the Baltimore-Washington International Airport (BWI), which is accessible by MARC train from Union Station.
That's good news regarding surface routes. When I travelled to DC four years ago, I had no idea that buses were a separate fare from the subway (sorry, metro). I tapped my subway pass on a bus one day, and the drive kept playing a message--apparently to me--asking to pay my fare. In Toronto, it's all one fare, so it was an honest mistake. But I hope DC extends its LRT route.
@@youbetcha6880 The Metro and the buses use the same fare card. (Smart Trip) I didn't realize they used to be separate, that must have been a pain in the ass.
@@youbetcha6880 What bus was this? The Metro train, Metro bus, and Maryland based RideOn bus have all used the same card system at least since I first started using it regularly in middle school (so 2008).
Or actually, did you have one of the plastic fare cards or one of the paper punch ones? The paper punch ones used to be available on the train up until a few years ago, its possible they didn't work with the buses.
@@scottthewaterwarrior it was a DC bus. I was in DC in 2018, but I think the issue now that I remember is that I bought a seven-day smart pass for the subway only. I think i did that to save money and because I thought I wouldn't be taking the bus. But then I forgot and tried getting on the bus with the card.
Free bus service to riders that live in DC and originate in DC
I'm glad you mentioned the incredible distance between Wiehle-Reston East and Spring Hill. Every time I take that trip I have the "Am I there yet?" moment
NYC, Chicago and DC transit systems, are pretty good for American standards.
Portland isn't too far behind them. Denver and Seattle are starting to catch up as well.
They all have their ups and downs, the infrastructure in DC is visually a lot nicer than Chicago or New York but the operations are much worse
SF is good too! Bart and muni!
I disagree. If modified for the best, then it can be as good as those in Europe and Asia.
The only system worth writing home about is the NY system. I’ve lived in DC metro area and currently live in Chicago. None of the cities have metro or bus systems that would be considered good in most other 1st world countries.
From what I read in transit forums here and there, the WMATA is very capable of running higher frequencies with ATC on, however the WMATA does not have a good record with safety, and does not have enough rolling stock to run higher frequencies. It can be sooo much better.
They could be reenabling ATO next year
Working properly ATC makes it very easy to operate High frequency yes.
what really grinds my gears is that they got rid of all their perfectly good rolling stock upon receipt of the 7000s! if only they had kept the old rolling stock…
@@toothbrush1237 As far as I was aware they were not "perfectly good stock." The 1000 series trains were not structurally sound and the 4000 and 5000 series trains were extremely unreliable.
@@owly6204 The 4Ks were really done in by neglect. They were never rebuilt and by the 2010s, were the lowest-tech trains still operating. A rebuild program would have probably yielded similar reliability to the 2/3Ks.
The 5Ks were really bad, but they were also decently new frames. Would have been much less wasteful to rebuild rather than scrap them IMO.
Replacing them all with one type of railcar definitely wasn't a good move either way.
What I love about DC's Metro: an expansive system with interlocking routes and fares based on distance and time of travel. What I hate: once you get into the suburbs during off-hours, it's about every 20 minutes between trains. And although I love the stations' architecture, they all look the same, so you really have to pay attention.
They probably could do with some sort of renovation project that would not make massive architectural changes, but just like some unique statues or murals or whatever at each stop, so that any glance out the window could quickly tell you which station you're at by the decoration.
Fares do vary based on time of day and distance.
Always loved the metro, wish it ran further up MD 200 into Olney and had some sort of connection to Gaithersburg/Germantown.
Great video! Some points about the future of DC rail and metro:
1. The yellow line is currently closed while they repair the bridge across the Potomac. The work will be done in the Spring.
2. Metro just today released a Blue Line loop concept. This would add a blue only platform at Rosslyn, then adding a station at Georgetown, then along K street, adding a stop at the Convention Center, hitting Union Station, National Harbor, then back across the Potomac, where it hooks back up north of Franconia.
3. Virginia has invested 4 billion in rail. This includes plans to build a new passenger rail only long bridge across the Potomac. This will enable MARC to terminate some of their services at Alexandria, in addition to a major investment in VRE rolling stock adding trains and weekend service in the next few years.
Sounds like DC is going in the right direction. Hope MARC gets some funding from Maryland for new rolling stock soon. Maybe after the purple line is done.
Great post! One small correction, I believe the blue line loop would go along M Street (starting in Georgetown), not K St.
@@sagarwadgaonkar7580 from what I could see. It appears that the blue line will still go through the foggy bottom, Faragut West and McPherson Square stops
MARC and VRE are slow and expensive compared to driving though. Driving to a metro stop is a lot easier
There will never ever be a station in Georgetown. The Old Money up there won't ever allow it. They still have cobblestone. They literally don't repair streets and have gotten soecial laws so they don't ever have to change the housing up there. It's historic....which has a whole list of advantages to it. They've been trying forever and have only gotten as close as Friendship Heights. Which is barely a station and more like a garage you can catch the train in.
I worked an internship in DC during the summer, and used the DC metro religiously. Despite the delays, it was so convinent that I could travel throughout the city and out to the nieghboring states by taking the respective lines or going directly to the union station. I also found it way easier to navigate the metro stations compared to other train terminals. I wish more states had such a system.
When in the US a couple of years ago, obviously I geeked out and explored the New York subway, Chicago L train and a bit of Amtrak. But honestly the DC metro was my favourite bit, with the brutalist architecture and huge trains
It’s a bit funny to me since most people hate brutalist architecture. I guess the DC Metro is one of the few examples where it actually looks good
DC… what a beauty of a system! The Silver Line Extension is what I have been waiting to see for a while. I can’t wait to go back and visit the area and check it out again. It’s been too long now!
DC area native here- Great video about the system!
It was once the pinnacle of rapid transit in North America (maybe the world?) and I can't wait to see it return to that status. The more and more I think about it, it feels like almost an S-bahn, with how the services differ from line extremities to the core. They do a pretty decent job, most of the time, dispatching trains from the outer lines so they end up evenly spaced in the core when service conditions are normal.
The Purple Line deserves an entire video about how much of a debacle it has been. It's a great lesson in how not to build a transit line. I really like your Orange Line idea for the capacity issues at Rosslyn. A lot of the Metro proposals focus on serving historically under-invested in areas of the city. As for our park-cades, we do have a *lot* of ridership that drive in from the rural areas of Virginia, West Virginia, western Maryland, and probably even southern Pennsylvania. The DC area has a very, very wide commuting area. A lot of the commuter bus lines were at capacity pre-pandemic. MARC runs diesels under wire because they need fleet flexibility between all three lines. They use the smaller trainsets from the Camden and Brunswick lines (both non-electrified unfortunately,) on mid-day Penn line trains due to lack of storage and yard space at Union Station. The 6 electric HHP-8's they have are usually used on the farther running and express Penn line trains, and I'm not entirely sure if all of them are operational. I'm sure you know how horrible the HHP-8's turned out to be. They were going to scrap them in 2016 but decided to refurb them instead.
Sorry to ramble! I could go on and on about Metro...
If someone else hasn't said it already, I highly recommend "The Great Society Subway" by Zachary Schrag if you'd like to learn more about the intricacies of the more local history and architecture of the system. Can't wait for more deep dive videos like this on other systems!
I have rode on NYC subway, Atlanta's Marta, Chicago subway, and Washington metro and Washington is my favorite of them all. The station architecture in the underground stations is amazing. All the years I've rode their subway I still am amazed at the underground stations there. I've rode every line to both ends of them except the silver line cause when I was last there the entire silver line wasn't finished yet. I have fond memories in my teens of riding 4000 series trains. I'm not much of a fan of the 7000 series kawasaki made trainsets. But they'll probably grow on me. I'm assuming that engineers fixed the reliability issues the 7000 series trains had ?
I had the opportunity to ride on the Washington Metro yellow and red lines to Union Station to catch an Acela train back to New York City. It was the highlight of the year in my travels for my work. As a native of Houston, Texas, which while I love my city is terribly lacking in transit, I relish any opportunity to ride mass transit. Once you experience traveling like this you realize how much better traveling by train is than by car or plane. I’m definitely planning trips in the next year or so to Boston and Philadelphia to ride their Metro systems. And hopefully one day to Toronto, Montreal, and Vancouver.
Living in Houston, you should also plan a quick trip to Dallas. Their rail transit isn't the best in the nation but definitely is the best in Texas.
@@highway2heaven91 I travel to the Dallas-Fort Worth area for work fairly often. While I haven’t gotten to ride the DART system yet, I have ridden TexRail from Grapevine to Fort Worth and it was a great experience. The Dallas-Fort Worth area has done the best job in Texas in building transit. Austin has a pretty ambitious plan in the works. Hopefully all of it will come to fruition in the near future.
The Acela is fake high speed rail, much more expensive than Northeast Regional and not much faster. But if your company is paying for your ticket, then you probably don't care. Legroom at Northeast Regional even in the cheapest seats beats planes by a long shot, with free (but fairly spotty) wifi connection.
Houston is not lacking in mass transit, tho is not good by my standards. Actually, quite extensive bus network within the city tho. Especially with this application that tracks busses real time, a must in the 21st century. Yes I do miss extensive rail network.
Train is good to replace short and some medium haul flight travel (up to 2000 km, ~8 hours) but beyond that train travel can get wieldy. Trains go 300-350 km/h with current technology and stop and several cities (but only for several minutes at most per city, not much longer than sitting at a couple red light or some airplane or weather delays, waiting for planes to take off, or waiting at a holding pattern) so you can do the math from there. Planes, can go closer to 1000 km/h and car 100 km/h.
Along the Northeast Corridor it's better to take train and the only time it's worth taking plane between Northeast Corridor cities is to connect to another plane.
I'm a graduate student at Rice University originally from Boston area, with very recent travel to New York City and Washington D.C.
I (used to, pre-fauciflu) travel to Boston on business often.
I always took the Acela from Newark, much more civilized than going through TSA security theater for a half-hour flight.
I've taken DC's, Boston's, and Toronto's. They're all pretty good
Been on the DC metro, it's one my favorite systems, I also like the new extension well. Thanks for making this video
No problem! I hope you enjoyed it🎉
Don't forget BWI Airport, just up the road near Baltimore, BWI has a MARC rail station that people can use to connect with the DC Metro south of there
I've done it once, and while its doable, its times consuming (went from Whiele-Reston to BWI by metro and MARC) and can be challenging if you're carrying lots of luggage (I was lucky I was only carrying a backpack, plus you got to take a bus shuttle from the BWI station to the terminal). I personally would prefer if the Orange line would extend and terminate at BWI, where you can also interlink with the Baltimore subway as Smartrip cards can actually be used on their network as well.
Only airport in the region with Amtrak. Conversely Amtrak has two airports on the NEC (and system-wide?).
I worked as a pilot. Many times I departed out of KBWI, but returned to Virginia airports. Metro and MARC made it doable. I live in the Annapolis area.
There's a bigger, more fundamental problem with the system that is unexplored in this video: It is great for commuters that are hit, but is horrible for actually getting anywhere besides work. For such a large, sprawling system with this huge spur going off to Dulles and a million park-and-rides, so much of the actual city and nearby suburbs are left without subway coverage and must rely on buses. A new east-west tunnel running north of Blue/Orange/Silver would make a huge difference, as will the long-overdue Purple Line.
Yeah there are many areas that are left in the dust. Bus coverage is spotty in the burbs and regular cancellations and delays are to be expected. I suppose that is the Metro's identity though: meant for commuting to work in DC rather than actually connecting you across the city and surrounding areas.
Most of the city's attractions and key neighborhoods actually have subway access. Important neighborhoods in the dense inner-suburbs are also on the Metro. DC's relatively high level of rail connectivity is unusual among North America's newer systems. But there are notable neighborhoods that Metro rail does not serve: Columbia Pike in Arlington and nearby Bailey's Crossroads, Georgetown (which is a decent if long walk from the Foggy Bottom Station), the developing 14th Street corridor just west of Logan Circle (but walkable from two or three metro stations), Adams Morgan (the Woodley Park Zoo Station is a long walk to Adams Morgan), etc.
@@machtmann2881 That can easily be solved by replacing many of the buses with light rail.
You're absolutely correct about Metro Station being a masterpiece. Every time I'm there for a connecting train, even when I'm stressed or late, being there feels nice and calming-I can just stare up at the architecture and appreciate the space I'm in while waiting. It's beautiful.
Thanks for finally doing this vid! I'm all for the VA extensions but really wish we had a loop line well inside of 495 to serve more of DC proper and the very closest suburbs where people are least likely to drive. Bus service is decent but obviously not as efficient. And the ride from central DC to Dulles is SO LONG. They've got to come up with some kind of express solution. I love Metro, I just want denser and more frequent service!
A set of twin tracks bypassing the Tysons stations on a new service pattern would be great. And this service can turn around short of Rosslyn to not worsen crowding on the triple alignment east of there
as a NoVA resident, this video was fun to watch. i've been riding the metro for almost a decade and the underground architecture still fascinates me! fun fact, my dad actually helped build the silver line extension through dulles airport!
I take the DC Metro when I’m in town and it has saved me lots of Ubers and Lyfts when traveling through town and to Arlington. The system has lots of potential but it was let to rot which lead to derailments which the DC Metro has been associated with. It’s good that they’re improving but they need more work.
Getting off an Amtrak/MARC at Washington Union and right onto the red is amazing. Two stops to Gallery for the yellow and green, and one more to Metro Center for the other lines. The entire DMV is accessible within an hour of arrival. And not to mention having stops at Dulles and Reagan, I can greet my visitors without needing to be in a car. Though I'm ready for the brown and other brown trains to be phased out.
VRE also goes to Union, so those who come from the I-95 corridor from Fredericksburg/Stafford/Woodbridge and from Manassas/Burke/Fairfax Station also benefit from this too
Don't walk through Union Station. Run. That place is filled with youths, teenagers, whatever you want to call them.
@@markthomas6703 Damn gramps, that's an issue for you?
@@InternetKilledTV21 😂🤣😂🤣
I'm glad they are adding some service connecting the lines, because right now there is a lot of spoke on the system but no wheel.
The first time I rode the Washington DC Metro was in 2011. I had gone to visit my cousin who lived in Friendship Heights at the time, and it was the second time I had ridden one because the first had been in Santiago de Chile (I am Peruvian, and our first metro line opened in 2014). The brutalist architecture that filled the stations with those illuminated vaults caught my attention and overwhelmed me to a certain extent. I wasn't used to underground constructions and I wasn't used to those long escalators either, but I ended up loving the experience. The system was easy to understand and easy to use. While I was with my cousin, I went to see NY and got on its subway, but the experience was the opposite. I felt unsafe most of the time (even for me being a South American) and the deafening noise was unbearable. That's when I realized how much I liked the DC Metro and its comfort compared to NY.
Yo tube la misma experiencia que tú, soy de República Dominicana
Peak/off-peak headways scheduled for July 2023 when the 7K series is supposed to be fully re-implemented:
- Red: 5/6
- Green/Yellow: 6/6
- Orange: 7.5/10
- Blue/Silver: 10/12
The Riyadh Metro's under-construction Line 4/Yellow will have just over 11km between Military Complex Station(Serving a hospital and university) and Terminal 5 Station. (at the airport)
Fun fact: the silver line extension was largely funded (over 60%) through toll roads on the highway it runs in the median of, rather than taxes. Could be a really good model for expanding transit in the US.
That was quite unpopular with many Dulles Toll Road users, who complained about having to pay for a train they "would never use"...but it was done anyway and worked out well.
Why should commuters have to pay for this?
@@wastrel09 commuters are paying to use the road, just so happens that the revenue from the road is going to a metro line.
@@wastrel09just like people who don't drive have to pay for road maintenance
I'll be flying into Dulles the day after Christmas for my first trip to D.C. I'm looking forward to take the new silver line extension into town!
Greetings from dc, I take this metro once in a while, very reliable and unique, this is I think the 3rd busiest behind New York Subway and Chicago L. But this is rather different as the stations are substantially more deeper. Planning to ride SV line to Dulles for my Christmas Trip
Reliability has been a problem in the last decade, but I’m certainly hoping it gets better! It’s certainly a much more modern system!
The ride from Metro Center to Dulles is LOOOOOOONG. But I’m glad the extension is finally open.
The Farragut stations were originally planned as one station but the cut and cover construction method couldn’t be used so it had to be two separate stations. There was a feasibility study of building a pedestrian tunnel a few years ago but nothing ever came of it. I think it should be built as it would make connections on different lines so much easier.
I think seperate stations was the right call. It doesn’t really make sense to build another BlOrSi/Rd transfer station right next to metro center.
They were separated due to plans to bring I66 into that area. DC said no to I66, but the train stations were already built by then.
I am from Europe and been living in DC for 5 years. Metro definitely shines when it wants. And indeed, despite covering 3 different jurisdictions, the governance has been dandy and just recently WMATA has been allocated 500 million $ in direct stream annually.
Now, the way it was designed in the 70s is starting to get outdated. It started to be a commuter train rather than a real mass transit system like NYC. And you can feel it around DC proper where there are large areas not served by Metro. And one of those areas is Georgetown out West, where traffic is a disaster. There is a plan to connect Georgetown to Rosslyn via a gondola system instead of adding a brand new line. Sometimes, WMATA does make some weird decisions but overall the system shines and I just hope the 7000 series come back fast.
I love this video and I hope it can be used by WMATA to make better decisions.
By the way, when I was recently in New York I was mesmerized by the Moynihan terminal!
Vienna has developed a lot recently. When I was a kid, it was surrounded by nothing but parking lots. But now they’ve developed a lot of housing with plans for more walkable commercial sites
Go over one station over to Dun Loring. Talk about great transit development!
As someone who just took the metro to Dulles and Will taking it back to apartment in DC, it’s crazy how far out it goes, it takes over an hour to get to Northwest DC by metro from Dulles. That being said, still great to have, and hoping that they will be make even faster in some of those more spread out areas.
I go to GWU in D.C. and I cannot express how much I love the metro. A lot of students at my school have internships/ work in d.c. so the metro allows us to have a integrated school/work life balance. As well, the ease of travel through the metro really allows us to have a cultured experience, as transportation isn’t really a problem when wanting to try new restaurants or going to culture institutes. I definitely use the metro on the weekly, whether it is to do errands in Virginia or visit friends at other colleges in D.C it’s something i greatly appreciate
I'm a student at AU and I can attest to this! Despite being kind of far from the Metro and us having to take a bus it's a really great system.
I lived for a year in DC around 10 years ago and it was great! The metro was really usefull to get around! Much better than the buses. Seeing the different stations made me nostalgic. Happy to hear that the Silver line is finally finished!! I remember being shocked when I arrived in Dulles airport and being told I had to take a dingy bus (lost in the middle of a big parking lot) to go to DC. (I had misread the information on their website, I was sure the airport was connected to a metro or train station... like any other airport I had been to).
Love the metro! As a Marylander I love how it makes the whole city accessible without having to drive into town or on the beltway
That's my favorite subway system in the US. I love that it is now connected to Dulles airport and I am very excited for the purple line.
When did it connect? Wasn't when I was there in December 2021.
@@AndrewDasilvaPLT 15 Nov 2022, two days before the airport's 60th anniversary
I'm a New Yorker who lived in the DC area in the late 90s. It's exciting to see the improvements in coverage that the system has made since then, with the addition of the silver and future purple lines. I always pointed out the difference in the development alongside Arlington's Orange Line stations looked in comparison to that alongside the suburban Maryland Green and Blue lines. I can only imagine how much additional tax revenue Arlington got as a result of that, which PG and Fairfax counties were missing out on. The system has always done a wonderful job of getting suburban commuters to jobs in the core city area, but practically useless for those living in one suburb and working or shopping in another suburb. A Metro line following the Beltway would be an amazing way to reduce dependency on cars, even if it's just a pipe dream.
9:36 It wasn’t supposed to be like that. There was supposed to be a station at Wolf Trap placed under the Trap Road bridge. However, MWAA made the poor decision to cut it out of the plans due to the lack of development opportunities. It remains a popular idea for an infill station, but they would have to suspend service in that portion to relocate the third rails to the outside (the third rails are on the inside, which is normal for at-grade track. However, they would have to be moved to the outside because it would be an island platform).
Question? Why would they have to suspend service to move the 3rd rail? Couldn't they just add a 3rd rail to the opposite side ( during overnight hours the trains aren't running anyway ) until it's complete then come back and remove the other side also overnight. That way they don't have to suspend any service at all ? Is that not an option ? Alot of track work goes on at night anyway cause there isn't any other time to do it without having to suspend service or have bottlenecks as they try using crossovers to the other track not being worked on go around the construction area and switch back onto the other track
It's unfortunate that there isn't a stop there, though unless the National Parks Service who owns Wolf Trap is okay with it essentially serving double-duty as commuter parking, it will likely never be financially worth it. Most of the provisions for a future station there were stripped out of the construction plans to save money and given the service impacts I'd bet it has a very low chance of ever happening. Maybe in a dream world where WMATA builds a third track across the Silver Line corridor for a Silver Line Express.
I worked for a Comic store that had all of its locations at Metro stations. First in Tenley, then Union Station, and finally at Pentagon City. I was able to work at all three of these locations frequently because I could walk to the Prince George's Plaza Metro and ride straight to work in under 2 hours. They even had a location at Dupont Circle after I left that was also near the Metro.
A fun cultural impact of the Metro is that the stretch between Union Station and Silver Spring is a hot-spot for graffiti artists. The whole way has industrial buildings and retaining walls that are perfect for elaborate spray paint.
i'm so glad you mentioned the graffiti there's a ton of cool art around the Florida Avenue section of the red line
I’ve lived in Northern Virginia since 1965 and have witnessed all the fits and starts plus a lot of drama and problems in building and maintaining Metro. Originally a line was proposed to run west from the city through Columbia Pike to Bailey’s Crossroads. In fact, major development began at the latter in anticipation of the subway. The line was never built because of cost even though it was acknowledged that the estimated ridership would higher than in the Blue and Orange lines. This was a missed opportunity and explains the “missing tooth” In Virginia that is clearly evident on the Metro map.
We really need better north/south links through ArlingtonIn my dreams there's a streetcar down Columbia Pike and another one down Glebe Road, lol
Thank you for doing a DC analysis. As much as I grumble about Metro's shortcomings, it's uniquely suited for DC's grid and structure.
Also, I'd rather split the G/Y lines with the Y line branching off at Mt. Vernon and going somewhat straight north to Silver Spring: Logan Circle, Dupont Circle, Adams Morgan, Mt. Pleasant or Columbia Heights North, Missouri Ave, Brightwood, Walter Reed, and Shepherd Park. Loop line, IMO, is fantastic because it would go farther south of Anacostia to MD and connect to VA.
Hope we can get a station at Georgetown
@@blushdog99 Likewise. I've seen the loop line planned out and there's a proposed station in Georgetown but probably by the disused gas station by M and 35th streets area. Personally, I'd put it in a parking lot on Prospect and Wisconsin.
I just got back from a trip to DC. I've lived in car centric suburbia basically my whole life, but when I was young we made two trips to DC. I had such great memories that I suggested my wife and I take a trip there. This was now our fourth trip together and the metro is one of the biggest reasons why we keep coming back. It's very quick and easy to get across the city and there are great walking paths throughout the city. What really stuck me this time was how peaceful the city was. Most depictions of cities are loud busy streets filled with cars blasting their horns, but the vast majority of the cars we saw were very quiet due to the low speeds and very aware of pedestrians at crosswalks. We walked to the Lincoln memorial after dark and could hear the birds splashing in the reflection pool. It was so beautifully quiet and peaceful. We normally stay in Crystal City, but we decided to stay at a hotel along the national mall. This was a great choice because the yellow line train is down until May so our normal 3 stop trip would turn into a 10 stop trip. Even so, we had a great trip and never felt the need to get in a car. Anywhere we went was easily accessible through public transport and wide walking paths.
Adding a new trunk line between Rosslyn and Stadium-Armory has been mulled numerous times. The problem with that Idea is that the demand in the west far outstrips the demand in the east. The branch of the Orange line to New Carrolton is the least busy on the system and the potential for development is not great (at least compared to other parts of the Metro). In any case, there are only two branches converging on Stadium-Armory and there is capacity to spare there for the foreseeable future. The places where capacity are needed are at Rosslyn, and Southwest DC, Hence WMATA's Loop proposal.
Plus national harbor is the biggest destination that has no good transit options too, which one of the loop line options hits
The way this is plan does not optimized for capital cost or capacity which IMO it should. Development patterns are easier to change, then the dynamics of the metro.
@@everacite and it would hit Georgetown which I'd say is the most frequented neighborhood in the city without a metro station.
When I was MUCH younger I remember taking the DC metro with my family from the hotel, via a shuttle, to the DC metro, and into DC. I do remember my mom asking a local how/where we would transfer so we could get to the national zoo as it was not a straight shot. Overall I remember it got us around especially considering how much distance we had to cover!
Greenbelt is heavily used by people commuting into the city. For example if I'm coming from Baltimore that's usually the most ideal place to park and then take the metro in. The big lot may seem like overkill but it has a purpose.
Marc got rid of its electric Engines first because the Aem7s were Old the hippos still run sometimes but amtrak apparently was killing Marc on the rate for electricity. Switching to diesel was more practical. Funny enough you can often see acs 64s pulling Marc sets
Glad someone did a video about our rail and mentioned Bart. I live in the San Francisco Bay Area and our transit is not perfect but after seeing other transit systems I have taken our system for granted. You really know your stuff
DC metro is great! While sometimes the wait is a little frustrating, its a super useful way to get to school. Transferring from line to line is super easy and a packed train from metro center can get down to the blue/orange line on the lower levels quicker than one might expect, which is a plus when a train is pulling in. Lots of different ways for passengers to move around the stations, which really improves the flow of foottraffic. Glad to see the hometown metro system featured!
I've been in metro's from Beijing to Budapest. Overall, D.C. has one of the most pleasant subway experiences I can think of. Add to that, the absolutely beautiful, Museum filled, pedestrian friendly downtown and all I can say is I'm proud of our Nation's Capital.
You’re kidding.
9:40 distance between metro stations
25.8km: Guangzhou Metro Line 18 (160km/h 8-cars Type D), between Panyu Square and Hengli.
20.6km: Beijing Subway Capital AirPort Express (110km/h 4-cars Type L), between Sanyuanqiao (Sanyuan Bridge) and Terminal 2.
16.9km: Nanjing Metro Line S9 (120km/h 3-cars Type B), between Mingjue and Tuanjieyu.
10.6km: Shanghai Metro Line 16 (120km/h 6-cars Type A), between Huinan East and Shuyuan.
Nanjing S9 literally built a bridge with a length of 12km over the lake
Can you do Pittsburgh’s transit next? It is a very unique system and the future plans for it are very interesting.
Edit: 100 likes wow
Gimme dat sky gondola!
Very much agree! I love that in the short term they are planning to increase service to poorer communities like McKeesport and then do richer communities like cranberry later
Does Pittsburgh have transit? I lived there for a number of years and it was a nightmare to get around
@@LucasDimoveo For a city of it's genre, Pittsburgh has pretty good transit.
Navigating through ludicrously silly hills in that city is a task within itself
I’ll definitely do it eventually but I have a long list of videos that I’m already working on so it won’t be next!
Living in the outskirts of silver spring I absolutely believe more frequent bus service is needed hopefully the flash "brt" will fix some of these issues but overall he DC metro is just amazing for someone with a tight budget
Hey RMTransit! While your idea for metro expansion will have slightly higher frequencies on the newly proposed crosstown line, the loop line WMATA is considering will still address the same area quite well, and in addition it would connect union, cap south, and navy yard on the east side of the mall, provide much needed service to southwest DC and National Harbor, and directly connect southern Maryland to NoVA via a south Potomac crossing - bypassing downtown DC and relieving traffic on the WW bridge.
Just as important, the loop address the Rosslyn bottleneck without reducing service at courthouse station and the R-B corridor by extension. This is what would happen if the orange line was the one decoupled from the blue and silver lines and not the blue from the orange and silver at Rosslyn. In short it has to do with the complexities of the rail alignment for the second rosslyn station coming from the west vs the south. Please see WMATA’s alternative studies for its downtown core expansion if you would like to dive into more of the details.
Overall, for the reasons stated, the loop line is better for the region as a whole despite having slightly worse frequencies on the crosstown section.
wow, I really like those concrete under ground stations!
Me too! I’m not generally a fan of brutalism and tons of concrete but I think underground it actually works really well.
They may look purely modernist at first, but they actually have a very ancient antecedent. Weese's vaulted underground stations imitate the conferred concrete dome of the Ancient Roman Pantheon, (with a hint of Piranesi thrown in for good measure), bringing the Roman-inspired government architecture of the surface bellow-ground. (The large vaults also serve to alleviate claustrophobia, especially during the most congested times in the brutal heat of summer when the platforms can be packed).
I'm a little biased growing up in Virginia and having the DC Metro as the closest subway system. But, I've always seen the system as one of the cleanest and safest in the country.
It's also worth pointing out the silver line was built primarily to serve Dulles airport, since it does serve international and long haul flights. For a while it was a major hole in the public transit of DC, because you had tourists/business visitors flying in and unless you were renting a car, you either had to taxi into the city or take a bus that ran about every 15 minutes to the metro station in Rosslyn, to then finally just board a Metro train.
Living out in NoVA, and having spent 6 years working in the city core, it's easy to get down and pessimistic about Metro. It's frequent technical problems, its seemingly bottomless black whole where funds are shunted in but nobody seems to know what happened to them, infrequent trains, the issue of the three governments all wanting something different causing the system to always be in a state of identity crisis (Though all three governments seem to erroneously agree it's still just an M-F, 9 to 5 worker's commuting system), etc. But I also come from a small town in Maine where our bus (heck, we were lucky to have a bus) didn't run past 6PM or on Sundays.
One core problem, as you probably already know, is that the system wasn't really built to grow. Or, maybe there was a little bit of wiggle room, but not enough for the region to explode in population the way it has in the last 45 years. The fact that there's only one track going in each direction is a major problem...pretty much all the time. Any issue along any line causes delays, back-ups, bunching, etc., that can sometimes echo for the rest of the service day. And when the system is operating at peak, there's ALWAYS an issue.
Being out in the suburbs (I wish we could afford to live in the city proper), the bus connection thing is very real. We live on a road that's serviced by two different bus systems & take us right to Vienna. Yet, those systems both run once an hour, and of course you know that means both buses show up within minutes of each other, so you always have long gaps between pick-ups. And the buses stop service hours before the train, meaning if you go out to dinner, see a movie, have a slightly unusual work schedule, etc., you're stuck using ride share. My wife often arrives at the station minutes after the last bus has left. It's worse on weekends, when the trains run later, but the bus service stops earlier.
So, I love it for what it could be. I really think Metro could be great. And compared to many systems in North America, it's not awful. But as a reliable way of getting around the region? Well, let's just say I understand why the traffic in this region is some of the worst in the country. I hate driving and am a very big believer in public transportation, and if I had a car and still worked in the city, I'd be severely tempted to drive to work every day.
@eclectic tyrone, I know. Imagine the very people for whom public transit is most important (those with no choice but to use it), who are forced to live 20 miles out of the city because of sky-high rents, are the very same people who aren't thrilled when it fails them on a regular basis & when they're ignored, while every effort is made to accommodate drivers.
But hey, us NoVA people are all millionaires in McMansions, don't'cha know. I'll just have my manservant drive me and stop complaining.
Hey thats my metro! My one issue with your video is the proposed realignment of the Orange line, that's where the streetcar maybe probably might be in hopefully a decade or two. I think that having the metro compete with the streetcar would be inefficient. WMATA seems to have have chosen to shift the blue line to a loop to National Harbor and have it loop back to Alexandria over the Woodrow Wilson Bridge. If they were to expand the metro downtown I would say they should shift the yellow or green line to run in the 395 tunnel and run it up new york avenue like some of the proposed silver line realignments.
I see no point of conflicts between both modes. The idea is that stops on the Washington Metro have a large distance, being generally at least one kilometre long while those of the streetcar tend to be around 500 metres and thus fill different nieches. There also is the fact that that there are quite a few cities where tram and metro run in parallel such as Berlin with Schönhauser Allee.
The only danger I can think of is when the extension is build, the metro is considered to be sufficient when the planners and council should be convinced that they serve different nieches.
@@MarioFanGamer659 I disagree somewhat. Unlike Berlin, there isn't that much Metro coverage of the actual city of DC, besides the areas around the line themselves. I think it would be better to use the streetcar and change of the metro line to expand the area of DC covered by mass transit. That alignment could be useful in the future but I think currently the metro expansion should focus on serving more people, not already served by a tram. Though you are right about different neiches unfortunately right now what is needed is serving more people in general rather than more people of a specific need.
From DC, just wanted to say thank you for representing our system well and accurately!
The new GM has been very vocal about improving not just service but also rolling stock. He mentioned that WMATA would look into reconfiguring the seats & adding open gangways for the 8000 series, and in the longer term pursuing full automation akin to automated light metro systems.
As for your extension Idea while its true the new alingments all serve the suburbs, I think the hybrid model works. With WMATA now more agressivly pursuing TOD/Joint developments at their stations, they have the ability to take lower density suburbs and turn them into dense nodes around Metro. Plus the line to national harbor would serve some of the poorest areas of DC, and add more coverage to South PG county which is sorely lacking right now as the green line is the only line down there. Though their proposal for a 2nd potomac crossing at the Woodrow Wilson bridge is indead stupid, and they should frankliny just drop that part from the line. Also more service to New Carrollton isn't important as the TOD potential of the stations outside New Carrollton aren't as strong as New Carrollton. If I had my way, building the Blue line to national harbor, and then seperating it out at Pentagon to run down the important corridor of the Columbia pike in south arlington, then hitting dense nodes at Bailey's/Skyline, Mark Center, & Landmark.
can't wait for the fabled georgetown station
It will be interesting to see what changes happen!
The WW bridge was built with room on the bridge deck reserved for transit right of way, so that crossing would be one of the more cost-effective parts of the plan. Plus it would provide a faster connection between alexandria (and points south) to PG county and southeast DC as well as be a redundant crossing if one of the others (yellow line bridge) is taken out of service
Yes Columbia pike is probably the area most deserving of a metro line, it was even planned to have one back in the 60s/70s.
From what I've read in a link online, it seems highly unlikely open gangway trains will enter the system anytime soon for the 8000 series train (a rather short-sighted decision in my opinion).
I've got nothing but great experiences when using the metro when I visit the region of Bethesda, granted it's usually only the red line. I've used it to see games downtown, site seeing. And I also like the architecture. The shared tunnels can definitely get backed up during rush hour if any delay occurs.
Always thought it was super weird that Potomac Yard didn't have a station. Nice to see they're finally making one.
I don't like that the lines don't operate 24 hours.
You should compare this WMATA to MARTA similar trains and atc systems
A note about the parking situation: on the Silver Line, none of the lots are owned by Metro. Fairfax and Loudoun Counties built the parking garages at Wiehle-Reston East, Herndon, Innovation Center, Loudoun Gateway, and Ashburn. McLean has a privately run parking lot on Scotts Crossing Road.
I have lived in the DC area for many years, and agree with most of your assessment concerning Metro. One thing about buses is WMATA runs regional busses that service DC and parts of the close in suburbs with terminal points at nearby Metro stations. Each of the local suburban jurisdictions runs additional bus systems, some of which feed into Metro, others of which go to local points of interest.
The proposed Blue Line modification includes an additional Rosslyn tunnel that would relieve a bottleneck, and bring service to Georgetown and National Harbor. The alignment you propose leaves these two areas out of the loop and doesn't relieve the Rosslyn bottleneck.
I agree about the suburb parking problem. The metro stations are oddly 10-15 minute off from the critical foot traffic area (e.g., Reston town center station is NOT in the town center). It is such an American problem. I lived in Korea for half of my life and all the metro stations are usually dead-middle in center of action. Metro stations bring the area to life and it really makes it easy to hop from one public transportation to another. Nevertheless, I am grateful for DC area actually having a metro to use. I recently moved to DMV and live along the new Silver Line extension and it has been pretty great to just metro in to DC/Arlington.
You could say that about most of the stations though New Carrolton is not in the city of New Carrolton, Greenbelt is barely in the borders of Greenbelt, Cheverly station barely inside of Cheverly MD, Landover is not in the town of Landover Hills, Vienna is not in the town of Vienna, and neither West or East Falls Church are in the city of Falls Church.
Building good transit has never been the issue for the US. At the times of their construction, New York, San Francisco, Chicago, and pretty much any other American city that built a transit system had what was considered world-class. Maintaining and modernizing the systems to change with the times is what the US has always struggled with.
Another little helpful thing I love: DC is a great system for cyclists. All stations have elevators or are accessible, there are wide faregates that fit wheelchairs and thus bikes. Pre pandemic bikes were allowed on outside commuter hours but nowadays it's anytime. They just ask that you use the front or back (not middle) doors of any train car. DC is a great city for biking, and knowing you can hop onto a train to take you home from a ride or do a hybrid commute is a great feature that I don't think you can rely on in every city with a subway, at least in N. America.
Just a few things to add. The DC Metro was built as a Metro to bring people into the city. In the 90s a lot of young people moved into the city and there was a desire to use it as a subway and run more frequently. Metro gave into this, and late night schedules were increase. The maintenance issues are largely related to delaying maintenance to run more trains late at night. The other issue is that there are mostly no third tracks on the system. So any issue with a breakdown (or stuck doors) means that its single tracking both directions.
One thing that you missed about the Silver line. It doesn't run through just single family homes. Loudon County is one of the fastest growing counties in America. It's a tech hub and might be the second largest tech area in the US outside of Silicon Valley. It's a massive hub for data centers and is home to AWS and pretty much every major tech company has a building there.
your coverage on branch avenue & largo stations made me feel so seen, especially those buses! but I did want to mention that just recently, 24 hour service is being implemented for 12 bus lines in dc! additionally, all buses will be free in the new year. great great video though, made this pg county, md native feel seen!
I agree that the DMV Areas public transit is the best in the US despite being one of the smallest in overall size (and it's kinda sad that it only exists like it does here). I don't have my own car and I only have a kick scooter as far as personal transit goes so when I want to go outside my town on my own, I use public transit and I'm lucky that I live here of all places for it. I've been to NYC and it's alright, sometimes even impressive, but has so many glaring issues (transfering to Long Island's rail is a nightmare if you don't commute with it regularly)
The WMATA definitely isn't the greatest ever but it has some MAJOR benefits (at least to me) such as:
- Reaching into 2 states outside the DC area - Virginia and Maryland (I live in the small in size not population, town of Herndon VA that just got it's own station in the long awaited Silver Line extension) and I've ridden up to Maryland a lot, and any trip into DC is trivialized.
- WMATA's partnership to the Fairfax Connector and other local bus systems (like DC and south Maryland) is so incredibly convenient I cannot truly convey just how good it is.
- The SMARTRIP Card system is the cherry on top, $2 USD for unlimited free bus transfers for 2 hours and depending how far you're going, even free metro transfers on off-peak times, and it's all very conveniently done with an easy touch to scan card. No annoying tickets or expensive limited use cards for tourists or anything. Just a single card with a debit balance of whatever you put on it. You can even put money onto it when getting ON A BUS. If you have say a $5 dollar bill but it's only $2 to ride, then insert the $5's (or more) into the pay station and touch your card to the magnetic pad and bam, the fee is paid and the remaining $3 is now on your card for later use.
- Peak time costs can net you a good $12 round trip at max, and an off peak time round trip is about $6 max (and $4 minimum) which is fairly generous honestly. It's at least more affordable than other transit systems in the US. It also still gives you the 2 hours of free bus rides so once you get off and it's too far to walk, there's usually a bus that can get you where you're going for free.
There's more but that's all I'll say for now. I've used DC/VA/MA transit a LOT in the two years and it's been honestly great. I love to dance so I'm usually dancing to myself at stations while waiting for trains and dancing while riding and it's just a dang good time for me at least. I'm super excited for the 8000's series in the future, especially because of the planned in metro charging outlets which for long day trip commutes like what I do, having a charged phone after a full day is very important (also I get sad if I can't dance to my music).
Over indulging -canopies and coverings are my pet peeves. I've seen bus stop coverings that are "shaped" to look like trees, but offer zero rain or sun covering. We don't need to reinvent everything, just grinds my gears.
Just visited DC, and it was so convenient having the metro directly connected to my hotel at l'enfant plaza
I haven't ridden it since 2017, but as a visitor to D.C. the Metro is absolutely a godsend! You can get virtually anywhere without driving, which is a nightmare in the District(especially parking!)...
@RMTransit , if you haven't been to D.C. and ridden the Metro, you really need to make the trip! Union Station alone is a great place to see & shop, and every major attraction is literally a short walk from a Metro station...
Nice video, I was an intern for Metro last summer and two additional things to touch on possibly in a future video is the systems unique and often criticized fare structure (no flat rate you are charged by distance and must tap in and out of system) as well as Metros greatest bottleneck in my option which is the lack of a 3rd and 4th track making express services virtually impossible.
As someone that lives near the end of the silver line the only flaw in our system is lack of express trains. Don’t think it could be solved for but could make suburb to suburb traveling a dream
On the Northeast side the red line is mostly above ground in Washington city proper, not underground as you narrated. It stays above ground until just after Silver Spring and then goes underground just before the Capital Beltway and remains underground all the way to the end at Glenmont. The Northwest side is the side that is almost all underground starting heading west at Union Station until it almost reaches the Capital Beltway and then remains above ground mostly until it reaches Shady Grove. Funny, each side is seemingly opposite of the other, the west side above ground north of the Capital Beltway and the east side underground north of the Capital Beltway, then they switch going south, tunnel for west, above ground for east until they meet at Union Station.
I rode on the Metro a couple years ago. It was surprisingly very clean! It was in the morning, however, and also a weekend and not many people on board, so that's probably why.
No it's always pretty clean and quiet, even when crowded!
It has been a while since I have been on the metro, I will add that Metro Transit Police also strictly enforce a no littering policy that includes no open food/drink containers.
I live in New Carrollton and use the metro daily for school/work. You hit all the points. The trains are almost always reliable and you don’t have to wait long for them (unless they are single lining on the weekend). Buses are unreliable af- really destroys the potential of a great interconnected metro system. The purple line has me excited af as it’ll help my small/historically newer city grow exponentially (plus it’ll make getting to New Carrollton to Largo so much easier). All-in-all ty for this video 😭🫶🏼
Live in Springfield (end of blue line) currently in high school. When I was younger and I still am excited to ride the Metro because its that great
I really appreciate your transit channel! You showed me a lot about US & world transit! I was at the Washington DC union station and the US capital this summer! I can definitely say,it was an awesome trip! Again your channel is wonderful & hopefully you cover transit dogs to! I love dogs! Transportation 🚆 & Dogs 🐕 for life!
The Silver Line does a lot better on the design of the bus terminals, as it is newer. The Wiehle station in particular has a TOD metro plaza with the bus bays sheltered underground. There's got to be footage of that somewhere.
I've been in DC since before the Metro and it is a huge game-changer. The rush hour traffic jams used to be epic.
But there is much to be desired about it's design. They did it on the cheap - there is no 3rd track so any delay caused by a problem on any line can not be worked around except to run 9n the other track which then causes major problems in each direction - this could all have been avoided with a third track - you need redundancy. This also prevents express trrains - every train has to be a local.
But having said that, I'm a fan - I have seen close up what it has done and how it has changed the region for the better. They are now talking major expansions and I hope they're smart and add that 3rd track
I'm a DC native and can tell you, like other metro city issues, the city has grown and has beautified a great deal. I can walk to the U.S. Capitol building, Union station. Gentrification has and is happening big time. The metro system is ever expanding. Some years ago, metro was able to curtail that loud braking and wheel screeching like you hear with New York's subway system; from what I can remember.