What about all this stuff about widening I-66? My immediate answer is no, we don’t want to encourage more driving, but what is the answer? I’m not sure the Orange Line can handle any more Metro riders at rush hour either.
The short answer is, given our transportation history of rejecting smart solutions in favor of the politically expedient, why wouldn't we expect Virginia to expand I66?
Originally, Interstate 66 through Arlington was proposed as an eight-lane double-decker 
highway. Only intense opposition from Arlington residents limited the road to its current four lanes and led to efficiencies like HOV and space for the Orange Line in the median. The website of the Arlington Coalition for Sensible Transportation provides an excellent background of Interstate 66, chronicle of local opposition, and details of current expansion plans.
The greatest myth about transportation in the DC area is that our problems are due to capacity issues. Not true. We have usage problems related to our work and social systems being set up around single-car drivers all leaving their single family homes in the suburbs at the same time trying to get on the same roads to the same city where their jobs are located. The majority of DC-area workers:
* Drive in their cars aloneOur region's elected officials have done absolutely nothing to discourage these patterns. Home prices encourage long commutes. Employers stubbornly demand workers come to the office from 9am-5pm daily so they can be supervised in person, even though many of us are computer drones who could just as easily work from home. When Metro tried to encourage off-peak and reverse commuting last December, it got little support.
* Go from rural/suburban areas to DC or adjacent areas
* Leave home between 6am and 10am
* Leave work between 3:30pm and 7:30pm
So what do we get? Attempts at easy answers.
Wider highways. More of them.
Even though a new lane of highway can only move 1,500-2,000 vehicles an hour. Even though the DC area is already an EPA nonattainment area for ground-level ozone and fine particulates.
And from the recent "forums" on proposals to add spot expansions to I66, VDOT seems hell bent on adding that pavement. You can read more on the strong negative Arlington reaction to meetings in the Sun Gazette and the Arlington Connection.
Eric is right that Metro's Orange Line is stressed. The system as a whole passed 200 million customer trips for the first time in fiscal year '06 (July '05-June '06). Especially during the height of the morning rush, the slightest problem can send ripples throughout the system, a problem I've experienced many times.
But we ask more and more of Metro without giving the system the support it needs. Metro continues to lack a dedicated funding source, even though it's the only major transit system in the area to rely on three states/districts for funding, meaning Metro has to beg, borrow, and steal every year to make ends meet.
Instead, we try to pave our way out of the problem without trying to encourage more carpooling, biking/walking, or reverse or off-peak commuting. Knowing the history, I would expect nothing less.
5 comments:
I'm old enough to remember going to anti-I-66 protests in the early 70s. (We used to steal "Build I-66 Now" bumper stickers and cut them into "I-66 No" stickers). As I recall, the road was finally built on the firm PROMISE that it would never be widened, and now there are voices calling for the abrogation of that promise.
Also, another issue rarely brought up: Assume for a minute that we expand I-66. Last time I checked, the bridges are the same width and the roads I-66 feeds into are the same width. What would be accomplished but a backup further down the line?
Catzmaw, two GREAT points. The Coleman Agreement set the road at 4 lanes, but was there ever a time when Faifax/Loudoun congressman WEREN'T lobbying to tear that up and expand the road? Not exact trustworthy.
As for the width issue, it would likely cost billions to widen the Rosslyn tunnel from its current 4 lanes. The original architect built it that way because he knew the Coleman Agreement would quickly come under fire, so he added that bit of permanence. So unless you're looking for DC's version of The Big Dig, you could expand I66 to 16 lanes, you're still going to hit that bottleneck in Rosslyn.
The Orange Metrorail Line through Arlington would have considerably more capacity with some relatively low-cost improvements. Adding tracks at Rosslyn so eastbound trains from Arlington can turn south toward the Pentagon (instead of clogging the Rosslyn Tunnel) and northbound trains from the Pentagon can turn west toward Ballston would allow many more trains to run through Arlington. I understand that these track improvements would cost less than $20 million, which is less than the federal transportation money that Congressman Frank Wolf has earmarked for building a third westbound lane on I-66 in Arlington.
Here's a novel idea. Develop effective communter rail systems that run right down the middle of the interstate and have stops, like a metro, at key areas. Thoughts?
Curtis, that would be ideal, and two such lines are on the drawing board -- Silver Line up Dulles Toll Road, Purple Line around the Beltway. However, our elected officials have so far lacked the political will to fight for either the toll/tax increases necessary to pay for them or the lifestyle changes necessary to encourage people to get out of their cars.
A great website for rethinking our metro area and the way we get around ...
http://greatergreaterwashington.org/
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