Columbus Day weekend Green Line service disruptions

The Waterfront-SEU and Archives-Navy Mem’l-Penn Quarter Metrorail stations will be closed, and the Green Line also will be closed at the L’Enfant Plaza Metrorail station from 10:30 p.m., on Friday, Oct. 9, through Monday, Oct. 12, with no service at these stations for three consecutive days.

To help people get around the closures, the Yellow Line will be rerouted and will follow the Blue Line route between the Pentagon and Stadium-Armory Metrorail stations with a stop at the L’Enfant Plaza Metrorail station on the lower level. Shuttle buses also will be available.


For more details, including specifics on the shuttle buses, visit the full press release on the WMATA website.

Car Free Day is Sept 22nd

Car Free Day is an international event celebrated every September 22nd in which people are encouraged to get around without their car - highlighting transit, bicycling, walking and all alternative modes of transportation. By taking a fair number of cars off the roads people who live and work there are given a chance to consider how their neighborhood might look and work with a lot fewer cars.


Washington celebrated Car Free Day for the first time in 2007 with about 1,000 District residents committing to be car free for the day. Last year, Car Free Day expanded to the entire Washington Metropolitan Area, and 5,445 residents throughout the region pledged to be car free. This year the hope is even more drivers throughout the region will leave their cars at home or go “car lite” by sharing a ride to work. By taking the Car Free Challenge, participants not only help to improve air quality, save money, and reduce their carbon footprint, but also get a chance to win great prizes at the Car Free Day Celebration Event (7th & F Street, NW).

Click here to view photos from last year’s Car Free Day Celebration.

World Car Free Day - Sept 22nd

Monday September 22nd is World Car Free Day. The event is intended to advance the economic, social and environmental benefits of self-propelled or mass transportation. It also aims to show how livable modern cities can be when free from the noise, stress and pollution caused by cars. Highlights for this year include the closing down of Brussels’ Capital Region to all motorized transport from 9.00 a.m. until 7.00 p.m. and the plans by Washington’s citizens to surpass last year’s 10,000 "carfree pledges".


WMATA is on board promoting this event with Car Free Day Metro DC and a You Tube video contest. The contest categories include: 1) Most humorous or entertaining 2) Most unusual or unique commute using Metro 3) Most informative/best documentary.

There will be a celebration event in Penn Quarter.

DC Car Free Day Celebration

Monday, September 22 11:00am - 3:00pm

7th & F Street, NW

Join the District’s Car Free Street Celebration with live music, free t-shirts and giveaways, Segway demonstration and test rides provided by Capitol Segway and more! Valet bike parking will be available as well as FREE bike tune-ups. You can also test ride and sign up for SmartBikes.

There is no Nats game on the 22nd - otherwise there might have been a strong chance of breaking Metro's ridership record yet again.

WaPo closeup look at MVSq metro maintenance

The Washingtonpost outlined recent efforts to implement a switch replacement at the Mount Vernon Square / Convention Center metro station. The article recaps a series of 12 hour work days spread across 4 weekends.

Blue Line in I-395 right of way?

As a followup to yesterday's post, David Alpert suggests reusing the segment of I-395 in a future separated blue line metrorail.



The separated blue line is part of Alpert's vision for metro in 2030. As gas prices have risen Metro has been breaking ridership records. WMATA's core capacity study, conducted in 2001, did not anticipate ridership to surge past 850,000 riders per day until 2014 yet we're already there. The Silver Line expansion to Tyson's Corner and Dulles will continue to feed in new riders to the system. But having the Silver, Blue, and Orange lines share one set of tracks from Rosslyn to Stadium Armory would likely choke capacity at the core. A separated blue line, while an expensive venture, would increase core capacity and connect Georgetown into the Metro system. WMATA included Alpert's system map in a May 22nd press release.

Images from GreaterGreaterWashington.org [double click to enlarge]

This vision is long term and a Blue Line separated in this manner would not arrive until after 2020.