Blue Line Loop: Blue/Orange/Silver capacity study

https://wjla.com/news/local/metro-relea ... wn-rosslyn#

WASHINGTON (7News) — Metro released new details Monday morning about options for creating a second tunnel between DC and Virginia to relieve logjams on the Blue, Silver, and Orange lines. Metro officials say they hope to use the need for a second tunnel as an opportunity to create new stations in areas that currently don’t have Metrorail.

The option that Metro says ranks the best on an analysis it did would turn the current Blue Line into a loop. Among other things it would create a long-desired Georgetown Metro station, and it would also create new stations in Southeast Washington and Prince George’s County, including at National Harbor.

Study:
https://www.wmata.com/about/board/meeti ... tudy-2.pdf

Added core capacity and VA/MD connections without needing to traverse the CBD are long overdue for Metro. Ridership is still down from the mid 2010 peaks, but continues to rebound. The region really needs additional transportation options b/c traffic is now heavy from sun up to sun down.

The map makes it look like the blue line loop doesn't use the existing ROW on the WW Bridge to cross the Potomac. Maybe it's a small oversight, but the space is already there for heavy rail. The alignment to get in and out will have some tight curves, but tunneling under the Oxon Hill Rd enables a stop at the MGM property and the northern edge of National Harbor. Once across the river, WMATA would likely require a flying junction at the HW1 interchange to be able to loop to the back of Huntington Metro.

The rest of the development options don't move the needle for the region in the same way as this Blue Line loop.

more: NPR

Will Metro go ahead with its biggest rail expansion since the Silver Line?

Metro has long been studying solutions to capacity issues in the Rosslyn Tunnel under the Potomac River, and they include everything from just adding more buses to creating a dozen or more new stations and a new rail line in the next 20-plus years. It could serve some sought-after rail transit deserts like Georgetown, Buzzard Point, the renovated St. Elizabeth's campus, Oxon Hill, National Harbor, Ivy City, West End, Port Towns, and more. The costs could range from $3 billion to $40 billion.
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The Rosslyn tunnel serves the Orange, Blue, and Silver lines and can carry 26 trains per hour. Metro used to run rush hour service that was limited by that capacity, but Metro is now scheduling 16 trains an hour through the tunnel and soon hopes to run 20 trains per hour in the coming months.
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The public was last updated about the project in 2021 when Metro officials said a Blue Line loop would generate the most ridership but also cost the most. That holds true today, but costs have gone up considerably thanks to inflation. For instance, in 2019 Metro said the Blue Line loop to National Harbor would cost $20-25 billion, but now estimates put the project at $30-35 billion. Operating costs could be up to another $200 million a year.
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This option would build a new tunnel under the Potomac and separate the Blue Line under M Street between Georgetown and Union Station.

It would also create a dozen new stations including a second Rosslyn station, Georgetown, West End, another Farragut station, two unnamed stations between Farragut and Union Station, Buzzard Point, St. Elizabeth's, Bolling AFB, Forest Heights, Oxen Hill and National Harbor. It would also increase the number of transit options available near Audi Field and other development in that part of the city.
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I certainly hope the developers of the National Harbor properties are on the hook somehow to contribute towards the cost of building the route under their properties...

My first thought is that a significant part of the cost will be the necessity to use TBMs, and to excavate very deeply below the existing Orange and Red Line tunnel(s), utility ducts and tunnels, and the far eastern end of the National Mall and past the Supreme Court. The proposed service map shown above doesn't make it clear how far east the Blue Line M(?) Route would have to go before it could turn south to serve the Capitol South Metro station. Depending on exactly where the tunnels end up beneath Capitol Hill, I could see a station being built on East Capitol Street and 3rd Street. Based on the names of the stations south of Navy Yard station it looks like the new route would be running directly beneath I-295 and South Capitol Street, which shouldn't be any more difficult to construct than the rest of the route in the District.

As cited above, serving the National Harbor property would make it difficult to run the Blue Line on the Wilson Bridge and also reach the existing terminus of the Yellow Line route at Huntington; a higher speed routing would take the new line southwest from National Harbor, cross the Potomac at the Dyke Marsh and curve north to meet the terminus at Huntington, with a station at the intersection of Belle View Boulevard and Fort Hunt Road and another station at the intersection of US 1 and South Kings Highway.

Another interesting thought is if any of the stations will be equipped with additional underground bay platforms, in order to provide a spot for trains to terminate for service recovery reasons. The London Underground's Circle Line was famously reworked into a "T-Cup" service with defined termini in order to improve pathing and scheduling constraints and make the line easier to operate. I would argue that Union Station and National Harbor are the two locations where additional platforms suitable for regular terminating services would make a lot of sense. If it isn't possible to do that, then I would provide double-length pocket tracks with generous overruns, to allow for high speed entrance and exits for terminating services in order to clear the running lines.

Where's Sand Box John!

TheOneKEA
Where's Sand Box John!

I am Here.

Using A tunnel boring machine will be a given.

It should be noted that three different segments of the system made use of tunnel boring machines The Red line between Rock Creek Park and Pooks Hill Road made use of a hard rock tunnel boring machine. Pressure balanced tunnel boring machines were used between the Navy Yard and Anacostia stations and from about 3.000 south of the Anacostia station to the Southern Avenue station.

The segment from Rosslyn through much of the NW DC will be tunneled through bed rock transitioning to sedimentary soils in the area of 16th Street. (The Piedmont escarpment cross M Street between 18th and 17th Streets.) The 3 stations west of 14th Street will mined out of the bed rock. The stations east of 14th street and south of the Capitol will likely be hybrid stations mined out of the sedimentary soils similar to the way the Columbia Heights station was built. The alignment across Capitol Hill will likely be along 2nd Street NE SE with the station at Union Station under Columbus Circle and the Capitol South and Navy Yard stations connecting to the existing stations on their east ends. The Navy Yard and Buzzard point stations will likely be cut and cover.

Me thinks the The Bolling and St. Elizabeth stations will on the surface or elevated in the easement of Anacostia Freeway. The Forest Height, Oxon Hill and National Harbor stations will also likely be cut and cover. The segment south of Forest Height station to north of the Capitol Beltway will run on the surface in the median of Indian Head Highway.

Nation Harbor to Huntington is not as complicated as you might think. The Station will likely be under Nation Harbor Boulevard and make its way to the Woodrow Wilson Bridge through the Nation Harbor Boulevard, Anacostia Freeway, Capitol Beltway interchange. On the Virginia side the line will likely turn south at Richmond Highway on an elevated and transition to subway south of Huntington Avenue turn west in subway south of the Montebello Condominiums turn north into Huntington station tail tracks.

There will likely be pocket tracks at various strategic location for put ins and take outs, the Y at C&J Junction can also be used for put ins and take outs. The thing that seem to left out is where is the service and inspection yard going to be located? Alexandria Yard does not have the capacity to service and store the rolling stock that will be needed to run on the line. WMATA is going to need roughly 60 acres land within a reasonable distance of the line.

My take on this proposal. The Blue line loop schema in my opinion doesn't really increase system capacity, It does provide some alternatives to a limited number of passengers but mostly increases the area served Metrorail in the urban core. As I have said numerous times, WMATA need to first procure more rolling stock to fully exploit the capability of the train control and signaling during peak running all 8 car trains.

Sand Box John wrote: ↑Thu Jul 20, 2023 7:23 am The segment from Rosslyn through much of the NW DC will be tunneled through bed rock transitioning to sedimentary soils in the area of 16th Street. (The Piedmont escarpment cross M Street between 18th and 17th Streets.) The 3 stations west of 14th Street will mined out of the bed rock. The stations east of 14th street and south of the Capitol will likely be hybrid stations mined out of the sedimentary soils similar to the way the Columbia Heights station was built. The alignment across Capitol Hill will likely be along 2nd Street NE SE with the station at Union Station under Columbus Circle and the Capitol South and Navy Yard stations connecting to the existing stations on their east ends. The Navy Yard and Buzzard point stations will likely be cut and cover.

I'm with you, but I would think DHS would demand pushing the Union Station to Capitol South out so it hits Eastern Market instead via 8th Street, then take South Carolina Ave SE to hit Navy Yard.

There will likely be pocket tracks at various strategic location for put ins and take outs, the Y at C&J Junction can also be used for put ins and take outs. The thing that seem to left out is where is the service and inspection yard going to be located? Alexandria Yard does not have the capacity to service and store the rolling stock that will be needed to run on the line. WMATA is going to need roughly 60 acres land within a reasonable distance of the line.

I would think there would be pocket tracks on the northwest side of Union Station, the south side of Navy Yard, and on both sides of National Harbor. I also think there would be a connection between the Blue and Green lines around Navy Yard so that the Branch Avenue yard can be used.

I can't help but think it'd be cheaper, and provide more redundancy to add a track next to CSX in place for the union station to greenbelt run, and use DMUs for the service, instead of building metrorail next to it.
Run every 2o minutes at peek, to laurel park (where sidings for turn around could be built), and maybe even use for service to ALX, once the new bridges are in.
Or even have similar , between New Carrolton, and laefant, to ALX. Call it Express Metro, to take some of the overflow traffic, and expedite those trying to get from one side of town, to the other.
It'd at least reduce crowding on green, yellow, and blue lines, with no tunneling.

scratchyX1 wrote: ↑Thu Jul 20, 2023 12:12 pm I can't help but think it'd be cheaper, and provide more redundancy to add a track next to CSX in place for the union station to greenbelt run, and use DMUs for the service, instead of building metrorail next to it.
Run every 2o minutes at peek, to laurel park (where sidings for turn around could be built), and maybe even use for service to ALX, once the new bridges are in.
Or even have similar , between New Carrolton, and laefant, to ALX. Call it Express Metro, to take some of the overflow traffic, and expedite those trying to get from one side of town, to the other.
It'd at least reduce crowding on green, yellow, and blue lines, with no tunneling.

You'll have several fly-overs for a Union-to-Greenbelt run, and will need to contend with MARC service and trains going from QN through F-Tower to JD down to the Alexandria sub.

New Carrolton/Union/L'Efant/ALX will get into issues with scheduling with Amtrak, CSX, VRE, and MARC... and besides, there's already studies on having MARC do such a run-through going on now. MD Legislature mandated studies.

STrRedWolf
I'm with you, but I would think DHS would demand pushing the Union Station to Capitol South out so it hits Eastern Market instead via 8th Street, then take South Carolina Ave SE to hit Navy Yard.

I don't see this as being an issue.

I also think there would be a connection between the Blue and Green lines around Navy Yard so that the Branch Avenue yard can be used.

The Branch Avenue Yard is the second smallest yard in storage capacity and smallest in servicing capacity. It also has very little land available within its existing footprint for the expansion of storage and or servicing capacity. The forested areas to the north and east of the yard have creeks running through them.

An aside note: I wrote my post above before reading this article at Greater Greater Washington. Adam Bressler made some very good points in his choice of the Silver Line Express option. My only problem with his argument is his use of the WMATA 26 trains per hour hard limit bogus propaganda. It is my opinion that Greater Greater Washington jumped the shark when David Alpert stepped aside. Adam Bressler writing on the subject is an exception to this rule.

Sand Box John wrote: ↑Thu Jul 20, 2023 9:12 pm I also think there would be a connection between the Blue and Green lines around Navy Yard so that the Branch Avenue yard can be used.

The Branch Avenue Yard is the second smallest yard in storage capacity and smallest in servicing capacity. It also has very little land available within its existing footprint for the expansion of storage and or servicing capacity. The forested areas to the north and east of the yard have creeks running through them.

Which means "we need a new yard somewhere". The question is "how much land do you need"? Because I'm eyeing some near the the Henson Creek Golf Course...

https://ggwash.org/view/90310/metrorail ... the-others

Metrorail’s looking at four realignments to move more riders. One is better than the others.
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Metro’s most pressing capacity bottleneck is the shared track between Rosslyn and Stadium Armory; all four extension proposals reflect this reality. All the proposals realign the Blue or Silver Lines under the Potomac River and through downtown Washington. And each proposal recommends the construction of a new station in Georgetown.
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The second alternative, dubbed Blue Line to National Harbor, has a few things in common with Blue Line to Greenbelt. Like above, the Blue Line would diverge from its current alignment with a new platform at Rosslyn before traveling underneath downtown Washington. However, instead of heading northeast at Union Station, this proposal heads south, under the Anacostia River until it reaches National Harbor. Afterward, the route crosses the Potomac River via the Woodrow Wilson Bridge (which was constructed with room for future Metrorail tracks), before connecting to existing infrastructure at Huntington Station in Fairfax County and creating a “Blue Line Loop” (Under this proposal, the Yellow Line would be rerouted to serve Franconia-Springfield).
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When I look at the capacity diagrams, what comes across to me is that the “Blue Line to Greenbelt,” “Blue Line to National Harbor,” and “Silver Line to New Carrollton,” proposals don’t think big enough about capacity, because they would still have to share tracks with other lines at other points in the system (either in Alexandria for the Blue Line proposals or north Arlington for the Silver Line to New Carrollton alternative). Small-potatoes planning like this would ultimately limit the number of trains that can operate on the new corridor, hindering the ability to reduce crowding and meet the growing demand for Metrorail service.
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Third part of Adam Bressler series at Greater Greater Washington:

The Blue Line Loop is flawed. Here’s how to improve it.

I hope the suits at WMATA are taking a serious look at this.

He makes good points, though what Adam misses in claiming his proposal adds only a minimal extra cost is that it would require yet more rolling stock. Which is a good thing. But his design calling for 26 trains per hour instead of 13 on the as-designed Blue line loop should take into account the necessary rolling stock when trying to sell officials on adopting it.

JDC
He makes good points, though what Adam misses in claiming his proposal adds only a minimal extra cost is that it would require yet more rolling stock. Which is a good thing. But his design calling for 26 trains per hour instead of 13 on the as-designed Blue line loop should take into account the necessary rolling stock when trying to sell officials on adopting it.

The cost of the additional rolling stock is peanuts compared to the cost of digging new tunnels and building new stations.

WMATA has had a tradition of not procuring enough rolling to keep up with the number of miles of track and station added to the system.

The Blue/Orange/Silver capacity study makes no mentions of fleet size requirements for the any of the proposed options including the no build option. Hell, adding 400 cars to the fleet in the no build option would allow all 8 car trains at 26 trains per hour on the Red line and the east west trunk. Something WMATA has never been able to do with the existing sized fleet.

John - do the WMATA railyards even have the capacity to store enough trains? I know the new railyard at Dulles is very, very large, but would it (or the other yards) have enough capacity to satisfy any of these build options? Or, would these build options need to include more railyards?