the Purple Line that should be

[wrob]

Sounds like a plan to me. Although I'd have it go
Four Corners -- Woodside/Forest Glen (transfer point
to Red line, with new platform on the south side of
the Beltway. Forest Glen platform is under and to
the north, making trips to the Woodside shopping
centers impractical.) A spur could extend down
the CSX tracks to Silver Spring from the new line
in both directions; spur could become a New Carrollton
Branch, or as you suggest, the Silver Line could come
up to College Park and cut across to Langley Park from
the other direction instead.

This is all moot because Metro's politically appointed
board members are planning to dismantle WMATA's unique
design-build engineering division in what is being called
a "natural transition" from construction to operations
and maintenance (cf. Washington Post article, Sunday.)
In other words, Metro will be hobbled and any future
construction would have to be done by the private sector
at twice the expense, making all current or future
expansion plans impossible. Tell everyone you know,

-Brian

It should basically take over John Cambron's Purple Line. Here's what
Columbia Gateway
Scaggsville
Burtonsville
Briggs Chaney
West Farm
White Oak
Four Corners (Transfer station w/ Purple Line)
Silver Spring (Transfer station w/ Red Line)
Woodside
Grubb Road
Chevy Chase
Bethesda (Transfer station w/ Red & Purple Line)
Friendship Heights
Tenleytown (Transfer station w/ Red Line)
Wesley Heights-AU
Washington Cathedral-Glover Pk.
Burleith-Georgetown U.

From this point on, you would suspect the line to make a transfer point at

Rosslyn, but then that would have to conclude to possibly a third rail line
The line will meet up and go along the new blue line route from Georgetown
till the banks of the Potomac River on the Virginia side. From there it
will head towards Lee Highway, going west. Here is what stations it will
Lee Highway (Pedestrian tunnel would be constructed from the new Lee Highway
station to the Rosslyn station which would cut northwest to Nash Street and
Lee Highway, where the station would be at)
Spout Run
Cherrydale
Westover
East Falls Church (Transfer station w/ Orange Line)
With this new line built almost adjacent to the Orange Line, it will reduce
congestion. I am sure some of you have heard of this idea already but I
decided to change it a bit. From East Falls Church, here is what will go
East Falls Church (Transfer station w/ Orange Line)
West Falls Church (Transfer station w/ Orange Line & Northern/Southern legs)
I decided to have the line split in two in Tysons at the Westgate station,
Westgate (It will not be a transfer station because passengers would deicide
which leg they would like to take at West Falls Church)
Jones Branch Drive
Westpark
Tyco Road (It will not be a transfer station because passengers would
deicide which leg they would like to take at Wolf Trap)
Westgate (It will not be a transfer station because passengers would deicide
which leg they would like to take at West Falls Church)
Tysons Corner Center
Pike 7
Tyco Road (It will not be a transfer station because passengers would
deicide which leg they would like to take at Wolf Trap)
When the two legs connect, they will go along their regular planned route to
Wolf Trap (Transfer station w/ Northern/Southern legs)
Hunter Mill Road
Wiehle Avenue
Reston
Herndon
Dulles Corner
Dulles Int. Airport
Old Ox Road
Loudoun County Parkway/Tri County Parkway
Ryan Road

From here, it will go North along Beaverdam Run and eventually go

underground along Ashburn Road. Yes, it will go underground once it comes
near the Golden Meadow Circle housing division. Here is how it will go
Ashburn Farm (At the Park & Ride)
Ashburn
Lansdowne
Seldons Landing
Potomac Station
Leesburg Corner
Leesburg (At intersection of Loudoun and Market Street)
----------
As for the Silver Line, that can become the metro that goes around the
Beltway.
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[wrob]

The people at the BeyondDC message board know.
Do you think there is anything the people can do
to help the problem? I know that sound pretty radical
but yeah.

Well, ACT (the Purple Line folks) aren't good for much,
they're too busy defining down success (they're now
fighting to keep the Purple Line from being turned into
a regular bus line instead of a BRT line that might
possibly one day be converted into a dinky-line trolley.)

They don't care much for anything besides light rail anyhow.
(Never mind the funding shortfall that supposedly precludes
heavy rail construction, which is purely political -- just
look at Seattle and look how Republicans are willing to
exploit their willingness to bend over backwards. If light
rail is cheaper, then buses are cheapest!)

It's noteworthy that the Post article explictly stated what
was only implicit, that the engineers viewed Metro on M Street
and it was blocked by proponents of suburban light rail systems
(Zimmerman et al) that don't want to invest any more in Metrorail.

It appears those engineers will be punisbed for their
ambitions by elimination of their department, which would
definitely pave the way for light rail alone -- no corporate
consultant would profit from creating a heavy rail division
capable of building a major WMATA Metrorail addition at
anything less than the cost of BART ($$Billion per mile).

-BER