Bringing Streetcars back to DC, part 2

Part 1 of this series looked at the beginnings of the DC government’s effort to expand the transit network. We left off in the Spring of 2005, having been to several meetings and having received several newsletters.

The study finishes

The final project newsletter, Fall 2005, and an “Executive Summary” of the whole project were presented to the public at a final meeting, held September 29, 2005. For transit enthusiasts following the project, the end results were disappointing and frustrating. Instead of a visionary transformation of mobility in the District, the final recommendations proposed a meager streetcar buildout that, despite its modest size, would take 25 years to build. The report was frustrating because it relied on tortured reasoning that bordered on downright dishonesty, it used self-contradictory and mutually inconsistent reasoning, and offered little more than poorly-defined chimeras wrapped up in wishful thinking.

Added to the project was “Rapid Bus,” as a lower-class technology mode, joining streetcars and “bus rapid transit.” Modes were assigned to routes. The newsletter used separate streetcar and “bus rapid transit” assignments, while the executive summary lumped these together as “premium transit.” In the newsletter, streetcars got a handful of routes: the crosstown Georgtown to Minnesota Avenue route; the north-south Georgia Avenue route, which would end at K street; a Union Station to Anacostia via Eastern Market route; an M Street SE/SW route, and a short Bolling AFB–Pennsylvania Ave route. A bit of “bus rapid transit” was added: mainly Woodley Park to Eastern Market via Florida Avenue, while the rest of the 50-mile route structure developed over the course of the study was designated “rapid bus.”

On the face of it, we’re being asked to believe that there is a significant difference between “bus rapid transit” and “rapid bus,” yet no clear description of the features that differentiate “bus rapid transit” from “rapid bus” is given. “Rapid bus” is supposed to have: limited stops, fancier shelters, real-time arrival information, and signal prioritization, as is “bus rapid transit.” They’re both supposed to use “large vehicles,” with those for “rapid bus” being “distinct” and those for “bus rapid transit” supposedly “recalling the design of streetcars.”  Even though “rapid bus” vehicles “could be” 60-foot articulated buses, the largest buses used anywhere in the United States, “rapid bus” vehicles “tend to be smaller” than “bus rapid transit” vehicles. One feature that was mentioned for “bus rapid transit” but not for “rapid bus” was off-vehicle fare payment.

“Bus rapid transit” is said to run “either on mixed traffic or on dedicated rights-of-way,” and several of the “bus rapid transit” examples cited do make use of dedicated rights-of-way. Boston, Ottawa, and Pittsburgh are explicitly called out as examples of “bus rapid transit,” and shows pictures of the system in Rouen, France. Both Ottawa and Pittsburgh rely on massive, exclusive and grade separated rights of way for their systems, built on abandoned railroad rights-of-way. Rouen’s TEOR uses several sections of exclusive right-of-way with optical guidance. No similar opportunity for constructing such facilities exists along the corridors proposed for DC, and surely such rights of way would be as incompatible with neighborhood scale as light rail would be. The documents make no mention of the heavy criticism that Boston’s Silver Line has received. Incidentally, neither Boston nor Pittsburgh use off-vehicle fare payment. I find it a little dishonest to cite systems whose success (such as it is) relies on features that are not under consideration for DC.

The proposed timetable for transit buildout is galling. All lines are supposed to start as “rapid bus.” Of the meager streetcar and “bus rapid transit” network that’s proposed, the newsletter states “Naturally it will take time–two decades, in fact” to get it built. The system would not be finished until 2030, even though the need is immediate and growing, as was illustrated in the Needs Assessment. And the executive summary mentions Mayor Williams’s goal of adding 100,000 residents by 2013 is cited: presumably, we don’t want to make them wait 17 years for adequate transit.

Similarly frustrating is the lumping together of streetcars and “bus rapid transit,” as if it’s possible to create a bus-based system that could be considered equivalent to a rail based system. Although it’s been quite clear in all the public outreach that there are lots of people who are excited about streetcars, there is no evidence that anyone is excited about more buses. This is not to say that everyone is excited about streetcars, but the opposition to streetcars does not come from an enthusiasm for buses. Streetcars offer better ride quality than buses, and the investment in infrastructure required for streetcars gives other investors confidence in the civic commitment. Indeed, while there are dozens of examples of rail-based urban revival, there are no examples of bus-based revival. Rail has shown itself to be far more attractive to riders: whenever a bus service is replaced by rail, ridership grows; whenever rail is replaced by bus, ridership drops. 

If the final output of the study was underwhelming, what happened next was breathtaking. Once the study was over, absolutely nothing happened. The study documents seemed destined to gather dust on someone’s shelf. It did not help that the DDOT Mass Transit Administrator, Alex Eckmann, left in February 2005, before many of the reports would be released and decisions would be made. The position would remain vacant until the study was nearly complete. The DDOT director who pushed to get the study underway, Dan Tangherlini, left DDOT in February 2006 to become interim general manager of WMATA. Because this was near the end of then-mayor Williams’s term, DDOT was left in the hands of the deputy director; no high-profile appointment was made. This left a leadership void from which no push to move forward with the transit project was made.

So how did the study team arrive at its conclusions? Part 3 of this series will examine the detailed technical documents produced by the study team.