In 2009, The Washington Examiner harshly criticized Arlington County’s plan to build a streetcar line on Columbia Pike. We concluded that a more flexible and affordable bus rapid transit system would be a much better option for the pike, which already has the most heavily used bus route in Virginia. We quoted Arlington Transit Advisory Committee member and retired federal transportation economist Joseph Warren, who warned that the county’s 2005 streetcar study violated professional evaluation standards and was little more than a deliberate attempt to promote the board’s preordained decision.

Four years later, members of Arlingtonians for Sensible Transit — including Peter Rousselot, a retired Yale- and Harvard-educated attorney who specialized in the valuation of rail and bus systems, World Bank transportation consultant Sam Zimmerman and Georgetown transportation instructor Robert Dunphy — have come to the same conclusion: “A modern BRT system is clearly superior to streetcars in the Columbia Pike Corridor.”