Chevy Chase isn't pro-Purple Line or pro-federal funding. It's against using the Capital Crescent Trail for the purpose for which it was originally purchased. They are just wildly grasping at any argument that will prevent all the citizens of lower Montgomery and Prince George's counties from enjoying fast, reliable public transit access to Bethesda.

The State of Maryland, particularly MTA, has done a horrible job at explaining the costs and benefits of cross-county transit in Montgomery County.

Much of the the blame for this lies in the ham-handed "leadership" of the project manager Mike Madden, who has lost the confidence of the public and elected officials.

Madden's goal, it appears, is to present as little information as possible about possible impacts of the purple line (both rail and bus options) and to leave it to the Secretary of Transportation and Governor to take the hit when a mode and alignment is selected in the beginning of next year.

A key milepost will be the DEIS/AA which was scheduled to be released in the summer and which is now being postponed to sometime in the fall. If the DEIS/AA does not include a comprehensive review of alignment and mode options, including tunneling, you'll know that the process is bogus and that MTA doesn't car about community input.

Can we expect Montgomery's elected officials to call MTA on an incomplete and biased DEIS/AA? Of course, not. Transit is an altar where all of the officials worship. They would rather have a bad transit system than no transit at all.

There must be some good way to bring lots of crime to Chevy Chase.

This is just another of these "NIMBY" groups surfacing as we draw closer to evaluating the MTA's proposed Purple Line. That's not to say that people don't have a right to protest these types of projects but the Chevy Chase people are not concerned about other potential users of the transit system.

In the final analysis, County Council members will have to make the decision because trying to appease Chevy Chase, the bike trail forces, Silver Spring, etc. will never bring about a sorely needed E/W transit system. My only doubt is whether this politicians have the intestinal fortitude?

wikipedia,the free online encyclopedia has information on bus rapid transit at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bus_rapid_transit

Please - build it quickly. We need more transit and we need it now. Also - it must be light rail, electrically powered, fast and quiet, and on permanent tracks. Please do not dumb this down by choosing the bus option. We deserve better. We are first rate city, let's go with rail.

If federal standards allow bus but not rail - then change the standards. Something is wrong with that logic. Light rail will attract more rides because most people want rail, not another bus.

As a former resident in College Park and former employee in Rockville, I think going with bus "rapid" transit would be a huge mistake.

Consider these facts:

1)- One light rail vehicle (LRV) can hold the passenger load of almost double a bendy-bus, or nearly triple a conventional 40-foot low-floor straight coach. That means less vehicles required, and consequently less footprint for maintenance base.

2)- LRVs can be coupled together in trains. Up to three cars in a train means up to 600 people on one train. A straight coach will carry about 100 passengers. That means 6 buses on the road for every three LRVs, but also means six operators - the LRV train requires one for that same number of people. It gets even more one-sided with longer trains. At roughly $15.00 per hour in wages plus overhead costs, that's a heckuva lot of difference in operator platform expense.

3)- LRVs don't use prime mover power when sitting at stops, and regenerate power into their overhead when braking to assist other LRVs that are accelerating or running at speed. Buses have to keep the Diesel motor running when standing still to keep up air pressure, and air conditioning or heating, whether conventional or hybrid.

4)- LRVs are more agile - they accelerate and brake better than buses. For that reason, they can cover a route on a tighter schedule, requiring less vehicles since they can cover the route faster.

5)- Electrical power costs a fraction of what Diesel fuel costs. Fact: every mile of LRTransit in the US today, in total, can be powered with less electricity than it takes to supply only air conditioning power to the District alone. And the LRVs don't require hydraulic fluid, anti-freeze, Diesel fuel, crankcase oil, or tires, all of which are petroleum-derived and highly polluting.

6)- Buses typically last around ten to twelve years. LRVs are operating today, and looking like new, thirty years after purchase. In Boston, Philadelphia, and San Francisco (among others), fleets of 1935-1950 PCC trolleys cars still give reliable, non-polluting daily service to the public. Find me one bus anywhere in this country that can equal that. One of our museum streetcars, now over 100 years old, is still running on the original electrical and mechanical equipment it had when trolley service was abandoned here in Minnesota in 1954! Look at the operating trolleys at the National Capital Museum of Transportation right in your area. Certainly the capital cost of replacing equipment on rail lines falls far below that of buses over time.

7)- Electric rail and bus vehicles are ghostly quiet when running, and nearly silent accelerating. Contrast that the the roar of a Diesel's exhaust while accelerating, and the thump of tires over road joints and manhole covers as compared to the glide of a rail car over a smooth steel girder welded into an endless ribbon. Modern rail cars are built with rubber pads in the suspension and wheels that reduce noise to almost unmeasureable levels. What made DC's trolleys downtown so noisy at crossings and turnouts was the slot in the street for the plow. Otherwise, they were fairly quiet. With overhead wires, noise at crossings and turnouts is greatly reduced.

Don't get sucked into the concept that LRT is that much more expensive. While the installation costs are certainly higher, it's the ongoing operating expenses that are the killer. Between the increasingly costly petroleum-related products, capital costs of replacement vehicles, operator expense, and the vastly simpler maintenance of electric rail vehicles, the long-term cost is overwhelmingly in favor of rail (or at least trolley-bus). Searching the National Transportation Data Base will show how much more costly buses are per passenger over time than are LRVs, and that difference is huge.

Regards: Tom Fairbairn

I say go Purple line... for the same selfish reasons people in Bethesda/Chevy Chase have no problem with the ICC

Purple line = NIMBY... but the ICC is... so I say go with it.. bring on more metro!

The Town of Chevy Chase spent ten years arguing that we shouldn't build the Purple Line because transit is a waste of money. Then they spent ten years arguing that cost-effectiveness doesn't matter and we should build something much more expensive. Now in the last few months they say we should look at bus rapid transit because it's more cost-effective - but we should never, never, never look at a bus rapid transit route that passes through their own borders.

See here for details:
http://www.innerpurpleline.org/townofChevyChase.htm

The Transportation Boards own report said that they expected 80% of the riders of the Purple Line to be from other forms of mass transit, like the bus.

What is the point of this project? It won't take any cars off the road. Spend the money on something else.

Please no bus rapid transit. Just don't do it. We need rail, light rail and only rail.

No bus!!

Great, so the MTA, the same organization that runs the horribly unreliable MARC train service, will be running this. I personally don't have a preference over bus or rail, but if it's the MTA operating this, it's sure to be a failure -- just like the MARC train system is.

I can't think of any quicker way to spot a selfish NIMBY than to have constantly shifting arguments against something that would benefit the common good.

I wish I could find it ironic that the left-leaning affluent Town of Chevy Chase is backing BRT, a Bush Administration "alternative" that is straight off the drawing board of the Highway Lobby. However, the mind of the NIMBY is clearly eager to go against their own general values in order to attain their own childish, selfish ends when push comes to shove.

Bottom line the Purple Line in any of its planned forms will not remove a significant amount of car traffic.

1) It is not Metro rail.

2) It will never be able to be extended west from Bethesda or southeast from New Carrolton.

A tram is no more comfortable than a bus and they run on coal borne electricity.

If you are going to waste the money please waste less with BRT.

By the Way,

Thomas Fairbairn is of these "Light Rail or Nothing" wack-jobs who lives in Minnesota. His writings on Light Rail are all over the Internet.

What is up with these Light Rail zealots. They almost seem like a cult. I really don't see where you get "bang for the buck" with this creeping slow, tram technology.

It seems like they have had this same argument in Australia.

http://www.smh.com.au/news/opinion/costly-and-cumbersome-its-time-to-get-off-the-light-railbandwagon/2006/01/16/1137260000769.html

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