Dave Alpert reports that “A committee of the Transportation Planning Board has developed a Bus Rapid Transit network proposal spanning the entire region, from Laurel to Lorton.” I’d like to see this eventually become the map of a streetcar system for the Washington, DC area but you couldn’t complete such a project in time to qualify for an American Recovery and Reinvestment Act grant. And a good BRT system could lay the groundwork for a future upgrade to rail. Besides which, this system would be a very useful thing to have on its own terms, so I hope other leaders in the region will get behind it:
The “rapid transit” elements in this “bus rapid transit” plan are “signal priority, some exclusive lanes or queue jumpers in congested areas, bus stops with fare prepayment and electronic real-time bus information, and low-floor buses” which could be done for about $200 million.
My only concern about this is that I don’t understand why the Orange Line of this network stops in Foggy Bottom when it seems like you could add a lot of value by extending the line slightly to Georgetown.