The state Board of Public Works approved Wednesday giving $22 million to Virginia Railway Express for 13 railroad coaches that are expected to ease crowding on the MARC Penn Line beginning later this fall.
The 135-passenger, double-deck rail cars are actually part of a larger order to Kawasaki Rail Co. that Maryland placed in 2000.
“We are getting them back,” said Maryland Transportation Secretary John Porcari. He told the board that at peak rush hours there are hundreds of standees on the Penn Line, which runs between Baltimore and Washington’s Union Station. The new cars will add 1,750 seats to the MARC train system, which carries 31,000 commuters a day.
Buying the used cars from VRE, which is reconfiguring its system, will save time and money, since ordering news cars would cost around $1 million more for each car and take 48 months for delivery. The Virginia cars require only minor modification.
The board also approved $124 million in two contracts over three years for MTA’s Mobility service, which provides shared van ride service to people with disabilities. The service gives rides to 65,000 to 78,000 people a month. The awards went to MV Transportation of Fairfield, Calif., one of the largest minority-owned transit companies in the nation, and Veolia Transportation of Baltimore.
State Treasurer Nancy Kopp, who sits on the board with the governor and comptroller, said she had just returned from a meeting of the National Association of State Treasurers.
“Maryland appears to be in fact in sounder financial shape than the rest of the states,” Kopp said, with the exception of some coal-producing Western states.
