RichardHarlos.com

Anyone who lives in the Washington DC metropolitan area knows that commuter traffic is the pits. I have a 22-mile commute that takes me close to an hour. If I use public transportation instead of driving my own car, it still takes me an hour so there’s no time savings incentive for me to mass transit. I try to make myself feel good about saving gasoline when I transit in but it’s an artificial effort on my part: I just like the convenience of having my own car and being able to go where I want, when I want, by whatever route I want.

Now it seems that the overcrowded traffic situation may be getting a break in the form of two projects: the Maryland intercounty connector (a highway connecting Routes 95 and 270) and the Purple Line route (”a proposed light rail Metro line that will run parallel to the Capital Beltway.” -from innerPurpleLine.org).

The debate on the Intercounty connector has been going on for decades and basically boils down to sources of funding (no surprise there!), environmental concerns and practical traffic congestion relief. As with many debateable issues I think a compromise can be found but it seems that for many involved in this clash, compromise is a hard thing to find.

Current issues being debated can be read about in the Washington Post article Purple Line Sparks Election Debate.

Additional information on the Purple Line’s benefits can be found on the SierraClub.org and the Coalition for Smarter Growth websites.