Montgomery County, Md., is working to provide a system of systems to make it easier for everyone to get around – a multimodal network.
Together with the existing Metrorail and bus networks, more multimodal options are coming online, with a vision of lessening the number of cars on the county’s gridlocked roadways.
Ride On extRa (or Route 101) is a limited-stop service from Bethesda to Gaithersburg that will launch October 2. The route will greatly ease the way for the large number of commuters stuck daily on the notoriously crowded Route 355.
The new route, however, is only the beginning of plans to enhance bus service across the county. The array of improvements including Flash, a bus rapid transit (BRT) system, the first arm of which is scheduled to open in 2020 along Route 29. The Purple Line is a light-rail route scheduled to launch in 2022 after myriad delays, while a greatly enhanced bicycle network will help solve the “first mile-last mile” problem – allowing people to bike short distances to transit options as a replacement for car trips and the need to search for parking.
Baby steps: making buses more attractive for riders
Ride On extRa is an early step in this move. The 12 stops – versus 80 along the existing routes – will, by itself, greatly speed up service. Transit signal priority will give buses an additional jump over cars, and buses will use the center lane, further speeding the trip.
This will be wonderful for current riders. Yet, “we expect to get new riders,” said Al Roshdieh, director of the Montgomery County Department of Transportation (MCDOT), particularly when people “see they can get on this bus and actually move as fast as in their car.” And Ride On extRa will be free for the first month, which will likely seduce all kinds of riders into trying the new option.
The faster bus line could particularly attract students going to Montgomery College in Rockville and the National Institute of Health, which faces a parking shortage, explained Dan Hibbert, division chief of Transit Services at MCDOT.
Other upgrades include Wi-Fi and USB ports, allowing people to use their time on the bus in a multitude of ways. Besides working, passengers can e-mail, check social media, read, play games, do anything other than concentrate on the road. And, of course, parking ceases to be a problem.
These changes are needed, said Roshdieh, because Montgomery County cannot succeed using the current approach. “We cannot find our way out of this gridlock and congestion just by building additional lanes, additional roads.” He added that 355, Georgia Avenue, Connecticut Avenue, and Old Georgetown Road – all the main corridors – “are fairly built up and there is no opportunity to add more lanes.” At the same time, the county’s population is expected to increase 20 percent and jobs 40 percent by 2040. Business as usual is a recipe for disaster.
Will people truly get excited about taking buses?
Conventional wisdom has it that buses will not draw choice riders – people who have cars and thus have a choice on which mode to take.
However, Roshdieh pointed to nearby Washington D.C.’s Metro Extra – which started on New Hampshire Avenue some four years ago – as an inspiration. “The result was new ridership; the numbers went up.” On Route 355, a corridor bursting with demand, Ride On extRa is expected to do the same.
Yet that is just the beginning. Roshdieh described Ride On extRa as “a precursor to BRT in some of these corridors.” On Route 29, a similar limited-stop service will begin in January, although “we’re not calling it Ride On extRa ,” said Roshdieh – at least not yet, since more of the specially branded vehicles are not currently available.
And on Route 355, after the Flash BRT service starts up, Ride On extRa will be extended to fill in parts of the network not covered by Flash, for instance going north on 355 to Clarksburg. Montgomery County is even coordinating with Howard County to continue the Route 29 system. After all, the world does not end, or at least shouldn’t end, at county boundaries.
Meanwhile, Flash BRT will add dedicated laneson at least 30 percent of its route, queue jumps, and long articulated vehicles. They will be wheelchair accessible without delaying the bus and will allow bicycles on board. Other Flash amenities will include solar bus stations with Wi-Fi, level boarding, and off-board fare collection, along with other improvements to stations and pedestrian and bike accessibility.
Flash will also be available 18 hours a day and on weekends, as opposed to the “peak-hours only” that will limit Ride On extRa (at least at the start of the service).
Forming a bridge to this transportation network of the future
Meanwhile, while waiting for the future, MCDOT is continuing to add improvements such as new express routes and commuter connections. It has already started a shuttle service from Rock Spring Office Park – home of Marriott’s corporate headquarters, among other businesses – in North Bethesda to Metro, drawing 200 riders in its first week. And MCDOT is modifying existing Ride On routes near Executive Boulevard – also on the overcrowded 355 corridor—to make sure that a bus to and from Metro is available every few minutes at peak times.
While switching to buses is inherently environmental (at least if ridership is high enough), Ride On already uses clean-engine technology and hopes to go further.
“Electric buses have been incorporated in systems across the country and we’re looking into that as well. And the technology of electric buses has just skyrocketed,” Hibbert said.
Despite all the county’s efforts, Roshdieh explained that “we are not trying to reinvent the wheel here. There are other jurisdictions that have gone through this process, either in the United States or overseas.”
Yet, in the United States at least, it is rare for county transit agencies to take such a comprehensive approach to public transit. Arlington, Va., may be the only comparable county, and it covers a much smaller area, while Los Angeles has become a transit leader at the city level.
Montgomery County is working to join these transit heroes, to tame the ever-growing, multiple-tentacled hydra of sprawl and gridlock that has a chokehold on much of our country. The coming decade or so will reveal whether the county can create a new map of the future – of smoothly flowing buses whisking passengers about in a gridlock-free paradise.
Photos of two guys being productive and social on a Baltimore bus by Elvert Barnes/Flickr. Map from Google Maps.