Some Virginia legislators are beating the drum to extend more Metro lines, even as other state officials are bemoaning the rail extension project currently underway.
Sen. Toddy Puller (D-Mt. Vernon), Delegates Scott Surovell (D-Mt. Vernon) and Luke Torian (D-Woodbridge) wrote a letter to Metro’s board of directors Wednesday asking the board to consider adding Blue and Yellow line extensions deeper into Northern Virginia when the agency revamps its map this year.
The agency has rehired Lance Wyman, its original map designer, to redo the system’s iconic rail map to accommodate some changes to Blue, Yellow and Orange line service, plus the addition of the so-called Silver Line out to Washington Dulles International Airport.
“A map that must last another forty years should also include two more concepts – the extension of the Yellow Line to Fort Belvoir and the Blue Line to Woodbridge,” they wrote in the letter dated from Wednesday.
The line isn’t funded – nor is it a sure thing. Officials do have $3 million to study adding transit to the Route 1 corridor down to Quantico. But there’s a long road ahead to getting a full Metro line planned – just ask Maryland proponents of the still-unbuilt Purple Line that has been decades in the making.
Meanwhile, Loudoun County and other Virginia officials are embroiled in a saga over the cost of the 23-mile Dulles Metrorail project already under construction. And Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli said earlier this week that the second phase of the Metro extension project should be scrapped, calling it a “rip-off.”
