PlanItMetro

Momentum employed a multi-pronged outreach and feedback gathering strategy, including both conventional and modern tools. Metro staff gathered input to inform a draft plan and subsequently, gathered feedback on the plan prior to finalizing it. Metro staff heard from almost 12,000 stakeholders during the outreach process through the following tools. The input has informed Metro’s understanding of the public’s short- and long-term needs. Read more…

The final public meeting for the study of Metrobus Route 80 (The North Capitol Street Line) will take place next week!

You’re invited to come see and comment on the draft recommendations for improvements. The study team hopes to submit the final recommendations to the Metro Board this summer for approval.

The meeting is open to the public and will take place on:

Wednesday, May 22, 2013
Anytime between 5:30 pm and 7:00 pm
St. Anthony’s School
12th & Lawrence Streets NE
Cafeteria entrance at 3400 12th Street NE, ground floor

Read more…

Come learn about the new Silver Line this week and next

Join us for a series of community events to learn about service improvements to bus and rail coming along with the new Silver Line service to Tysons Corner and Reston.  We will be on-hand to discuss what the new service means to you, including changes to the Orange and Blue Lines, and local buses.

The “main event” will be three Open Houses which will feature informational exhibits on rail and bus service, a table where we will be collecting public feedback, a section for children’s activities as well as a “WMATA tools section” where folks can learn about Next Bus, sign-up for e-Alerts and get other useful information. Here’s the schedule and locations:

–      Tuesday, March 12, 5-8p at Faith Temple #2 Baptist Church, 211 Maryland Park Drive, Capitol Hgts., MD 20743 (walk from Capitol Heights Metrorail station, Metrobus 96 or 97)

–      Thursday, March 14, 5-8p at the Reston Community Center Hunters Woods, 2310 Colts Neck Road, Reston, VA 20191 (Fairfax Connector: RIBS 1/3, RIBS 2 & Route 551)

–      Saturday, March 16, 11a-4p at the Sheraton Crystal City, 1800 Jefferson Davis Highway, Arlington, VA  22202 (walk from Crystal City Metrorail station, Metrobus 9A, 9E, 9S, 10A, 10E)

Prior to the Open Houses, we will host a series of smaller events or “Pop-Ups” this week in the community.   At each of these, we’ll be stationed at a table to answer your questions, provide information and give you a chance to provide us your feedback.  Here’s the schedule and locations for these events:

–      March 5, 4-6p at Largo Town Center Metro

–      March 7, 4-6p at West Falls Church Metro

–      March 8, 10a-2p at Tysons Corner Center Mall I (on the first floor near Barnes & Noble)

–      March  8, 4-6p at Pentagon City Metro

–      March 9, 10a-2p at the Eden Center (6751 Wilson Blvd, Falls Church, VA 22044)

The public comment period will run from February 28 through March 18, 2013.  You may submit your comments at the events or online on the project’s website, wmata.com/silverline.

On January 17th and 18th, two staffers from Metro’s Office of Planning attended a two day transit network design course, offered by long time transit planning consultant, transit blogger and now author, Jarrett Walker.  In transit planning circles, Walker’s recent efforts, culminating with “Human Transit,” have been very well regarded.  For many planners, his book has been a breath of fresh air in helping to demystify how complex transit offerings can be made more simple, customer focused, effective, and useful for everyday city life.  Many planners have an appreciation of the attention he has given to linguistics, and how word choice (i.e., the use of “transfer” vs. “connection” or “transit route” vs. “transit line”) can subtly reinforce or undermine certain collective beliefs about the usefulness of transit, or anything else for that matter.

The participants in the DC course were fairly diverse, although all of those in attendance had a vested interest in transit in some way.  Among these were urban planners, consultants, advocates, and transit planners, among others.  Care was taken to ensure that each working group had a included at least one transit professional mixed with other disciplines and backgrounds in order to facilitate a balanced discussion. Read more…

Countywide Master Plan Transit Corridors.(Click for larger size.)

While Metro works to bring the transit system back up to a state of good repair as well as looking to the future of Metro, we continue to work with our jurisdictional partners on various transit studies and projects to expand the region’s transit system.  In Montgomery County, since 2008 much of the transit expansion planning has focused on developing a countywide Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) system, most recently through the recommendations of the county’s Transit Task Force earlier this year.

Seeking to take another step towards defining the county’s transit future, the Montgomery County Planning Department is holding a series of public meetings in the coming days to hear from the public on an update of the county’s master plan to consider how BRT might be incorporated within the transportation corridors under study.  Above is a map of the proposed corridors under review.

You can find Montgomery County planning staff’s recommendations online (22MB pdf).

In September, we presented to the TAG the results of the first round of scenarios modeled in the second phase of the RTSP study.  Scenarios are defined by a collection of strategies or projects identified in the initial phase of the RTSP.  The four scenarios tested focused on maximizing the existing infrastructure, expanding surface transit, expanding transit in the core, and expanding transit system wide.  The performance of each scenario was evaluated against a set of measures to determine the relative effectiveness of each compared to the baseline scenario, defined by the regional list of projects in the currently adopted Constrained Long Range Plan, and MWCOG Cooperative Forecasts Round 8.0 land use.

Phase II Process Overview: Click to Enlarge

Regional measures such as total transit trips, mode share, vehicle miles traveled, households and jobs within a half-mile of transit, travel time savings, and transit congestion were evaluated to not only determine how well the scenarios performed against each other over the baseline, but to assess how well each satisfied the goals and objectives of the RTSP.  In addition to these broad-based regional measures, the first round of scenario modeling focused on how well each scenario addressed the need to expand capacity within the system core.  Peak period Metrorail link capacity and transfer activity at key core stations were measured against the baseline scenario to determine if the potential build scenarios could provide sufficient capacity to serve future demand, and how well such added capacity could be utilized.

For more information on scenario descriptions, measured results, and key findings download meeting materials: TAG 9 Presentation of Results

Read more…

Metro’s Board of Directors will host six public hearings in Washington, D.C., Maryland and Virginia beginning Feb. 27, where members of the public may provide formal testimony regarding the budget and fare proposals. Members of the public may provide formal testimony regarding the budget and fare proposals, which are included in the docket of budget actions. The proposed operating and capital budgets for the next fiscal year support the critical rebuilding of the Metro system, and improving safety and reliability. The budget also provides service enhancements such as additional rush hour rail service, improved escalator maintenance, enhanced bus corridor services, increased security and continued compliance with National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) recommendations.

Preceding each of the formal public hearings, Metro will host an hour-long Open Forum with multimedia stations to engage stakeholders and solicit public input. The Open Forum will include a video presentation on Metro’s rebuilding program, tables staffed by senior Metrobus, Metrorail, MetroAccess, SmarTrip and police officials who will be available to talk with participants and answer individual questions, and a third station where computers will be made available to take an online survey regarding Metro’s priorities, as well as to submit written comments for the record.

Details and directions for transit travel to the public sessions are available on Metro’s website or via the hyperlinks below. Open forums begin at 6 p.m., followed by the public hearings at 7 p.m. The hearings will take place as follows:

Monday, Feb. 27
Bethesda Chevy Chase Regional Services Center – Hearing 569
4805 Edgemoor Lane
Bethesda, MD

Wednesday, Feb. 29
Mary Ellen Henderson Middle School Cafeteria – Hearing 570
7130 Leesburg Pike
Falls Church, VA

Thursday, March 1
Matthews Memorial Baptist Church – Hearing 571
John H. Kearney, Sr. Fellowship Hall
2616 Martin Luther King Jr. Ave., SE
Washington, DC

Monday, March 5
Washington Lee High School Cafeteria – Hearing 572
1301 N Stafford St
Arlington, VA

Tuesday, March 6
St. Columba’s Episcopal Church – Hearing 573
4201 Albemarle Street, NW
Washington, DC

Wednesday, March 7
First United Methodist Church – Hearing 574
6201 Belcrest Road
Hyattsville, MD

Written statements and exhibits may be sent to the Office of the Secretary, Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority, 600 Fifth Street, N.W., Washington, D.C. 20001, or e-mailed to writtentestimony@wmata.com. Statements also may be faxed to 202-962-1133. Please reference the hearing number. Submissions must be received by 5 p.m. on Monday, March 12. A survey on possible options to balance the budget will be available on Metro’s website from 5p.m. on Wednesday, Feb. 22 until 5 p.m. on Monday, March 12.

Additional information can be found in the press release.

Metro is working with the Virginia Department of Rail and Public Transportation (DRPT) on the Super NoVa project to identify travel needs, evaluate current gaps in transit and TDM programs, and identify a vision to improve mobility. DRPT will be hosting a set of four public meetings through northern Virginia to gather your comments/ideas on bus, rail, carpooling, and vanpooling. The Super NoVa region considers the needs of commuters in northern Virginia as well as those from Washington D.C., Maryland, and West Virginia.

Citizens are invited to learn more about the study and provide feedback by attending any one of the following identical meetings. For special assistance or information, call 804-786-4440 or TDD 711 at least 48 hours in advance of the meeting date.

Other mechanisms to participate include:

Written comments also may be sent to: Super NoVa Transit/TDM Vision Plan, 11400 Commerce Park Drive, Suite 400, Reston, VA 20191.

Si usted necesita servicios de traducción a participar, por favor manda un email: espanol@kimley-horn.com

May 5, 2011

In May, we continued to provide the TAG with model results of several strategies aimed to improve surface transit in the region, such as an enhanced priority corridor network, streetcar network, and light rail extensions. This round of modeling also tested new Metrorail lines including a beltway line and new brown line. Finally, additional Metrorail enhancements were considered such as a relocated silver line with a Ballston-Rosslyn bypass, and a new set of extensions to suburban activity centers. The results of these model runs show the impact of each of these strategies on weekday transit boardings by mode, Metrorail boardings by line, regional transit share, regional transit linked trips, as well as an examination of passengers per rail car during the peak hour. The strategies modeled during this round address the need to increase core system capacity, connect to new and emerging markets, and provide priority for and enhancements to surface transit corridors in the region – three of the four goals of the RTSP.

Download the Meeting Materials: TAG_07_Meeting.pdf (PDF, 3.1 MB)

In January 2011 we continued to provide the TAG with model results of several strategies designed to provide more access to transit.  The model results of these strategies highlight the myriad methods that can be employed to meet future transit demand in the Washington metropolitan area.  During this presentation we also presented the proposed RTSP public engagement strategy; a revised project schedule and solicited jurisdictional representatives for additional strategies they would like to see modeled.

TAG Meeting #6 Presentation (PDF)