
How D.C. spent $200M over a decade on a streetcar you still can’t ride - e15ctr0n
https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/trafficandcommuting/how-dc-spent-200-million-over-a-decade-on-a-streetcar-you-still-cant-ride/2015/12/05/3c8a51c6-8d48-11e5-acff-673ae92ddd2b_story.html
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afiedler
As a DC resident, this project is really ridiculous for a few reasons. First
of all, it is no faster than a bus because it still does not have a dedicated
right-of-way. It also follows the side of the street instead of the center, so
it constantly smashes mirrors of parked cars. Sometimes, people parallel park
poorly and completely block the tracks, delaying service until the car can be
towed. Buses don't have that problem, obviously.

Finally, it is forecast to make $450,000 in revenue per year on $5.1 million
in operating expenses. I realize most transit systems don't make a profit, but
that is crazy. You could literally buy every single streetcar rider rides on
UberPool for less money.

~~~
Retric
Paying for Uber rides does not include paying for new roads. DC traffic is bad
enough they need higher density options. If that's busses with dedicated right
of way, or street cars with dedicated lanes, or new subway stations they need
to do something _that people will actually use._

PS: I don't live in DC in large part due to traffic issues, but also giving up
the right to vote bothers me deeply. So, this is from someone that lives close
to, but not in DC.

~~~
natermer
Paying for rail doesn't do anything to alleviate the need to pay for roads
though. The comparison really is paying for trolley vs paying for Uber (or
whatever)

Rail is only useful in certain situations and it's only useful if done
correctly. Neither of these things are happening in this case.

And don't worry about your vote. It's really irrelevant. It's really about
making you feel like you have a voice then actually you having a voice.

------
dajohnson89
There is a lot of frustration with the DC subway system. Check out these two
(frequently updated!) twitter accounts for example:

[https://twitter.com/unsuckdcmetro](https://twitter.com/unsuckdcmetro)

[https://twitter.com/dcmetrosucks](https://twitter.com/dcmetrosucks)

One area the streetcar plans to serve is the H Street Corridor. It's currently
not really served by the subway system, so supposedly the powers-that-be
decided it was a lower-cost solution. At $200m and 10 years though (and
counting), I wish a subway system expansion would have been implemented.

I would gladly pay more tax dollars for a more extensive (and less sucky)
subway network here in DC. Instead, I'm spending that money on Uber, when I
find out that the next train comes in 20 minutes.

I should add that a monthly pass for the DC metro costs more than twice than
NYC's (the 2nd most expensive in the country), and more than triple San
Francisco's.

~~~
AdmiralAsshat
The DC Metro is an abomination. I regularly spend about 40 minutes waiting for
my girlfriend at the end of one of the lines as she gets on a trip that should
take 20. Everything from "Single tracking on line between EVERYWHERE due to
construction" to train inexplicably stopping on tracks for 10 minutes, to
trains simply deciding not to run in that direction with absolutely no
warning, no explanation why, and no ETL on the next train.

It boggles the mind to think how any work gets done in DC when the public
transit system is so terrible.

Oh, wait...

~~~
smacktoward
The saddest part is that Metro _used_ to be incredible. I first moved to DC in
1993, and back then the trains were on time, the cars were clean, and the
fares were low. It was excellent. People routinely pointed to it as the best
thing about living in the District.

It's taken two decades of neglect and mismanagement to turn it into the horror
show it is today.

~~~
epoxyhockey
IMHO, the turning point several years ago was when Metro went from automated
mode to manual mode after having to go from 6 car trains to 8 car trains.
Apparently, the automated mode, where the train driver just looks out for
anomalies, doesn't have enough precision to handle 8 car trains that consume
the entire platform at stations.

Under automated mode, you had consistent threshold breaking and acceleration,
door opening times, etc. It was a very smooth ride.

~~~
JPKab
The switch to manual mode was much more due to the fatal Red Line accident
than it was due to 8 cars.

Either way, it's a symptom of the fact that the WMTA Union has suppressed the
number of full-time positions for mechanics to ensure that existing mechanics
get plenty of overtime pay. The result is a system where a single mechanic
working a 12 hours shift is preferable to two mechanics working 6 hours each
and getting something fixed. From the perspective of ANYONE other than the
unionized workers, this is not ideal.

Any riders can see the results of this on a daily basis. The escalators remain
broken for months on end, and disabled riders end up having to go to entirely
different stations because the elevators will remain out for months as well.

I'll paste a link to a publication that I really don't like, but this
particular article is actually very accurate. Sadly, the non-fringe media in
DC are afraid to cover this story, despite the fact that anyone who has ever
applied to work at the DC Metro can tell you this first-hand, and the data
backs it up:

[http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2012/03/29/exposed-dc-
metro-...](http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2012/03/29/exposed-dc-metro-
subways-racist-willfully-incompetent-policies/)

------
drfritznunkie
I live a couple of blocks from this boondoggle, but some of the issues aren't
strictly the streetcars fault. For instance, this very morning while walking
my dogs, a DC tow truck sped past us all code 3. We rounded the corner onto H
ST, and saw the tow truck using the wheel lift, fully extended, to push a car
out of the way of the streetcar. And it wasn't like this car was just over the
line, the driver had left its ass end hanging about a foot and a half out into
the traffic lane. Whomever was driving that wrecker was masterful, blocking
the entire street for only about 60 seconds while he rammed the car into
place.

Any improvement in public transit is also going to require improvements in the
quality of driving out there. People are selfish idiots when in their cars.

~~~
Someone1234
I'd argue that's a design problem.

A lot of cities have built street cars in the middle of the road, or they
place concrete edge between parking and the street car's lane to stop exactly
that from happening. Why didn't DC?

This seems incredibly dangerous and poorly thought out:

[http://i.imgur.com/WbWrf9l.jpg](http://i.imgur.com/WbWrf9l.jpg)

I understand that civil engineers are sometimes handcuffed with what they can
do. But the city really needs to decide how seriously it is about this
project, and either design the city around the streetcars or just eliminate
them completely.

It just looks like they tried to half-arse it and it blow up in their face.

Honestly Salt Lake City is a map of where the US needs to go, not DC. Cycling
lanes everywhere and streetcars with dedicated space and priority. It isn't
perfect (cycling lanes need more protection, like Copenhagen, actual concrete
to stop cars driving or parking in them) but it is darn good by the US's
standard.

~~~
distances
I've lived in two European cities with extensive tram lines. Both of them have
trams on the streets, but the other one also has dedicated lanes in places
where streets are wide enough. The dedicated ones are very fast and enjoyable
to ride, but even the on-the-street lines are way better than buses.

Blocking the rails happens very rarely, so I assume it's about everyone
getting used to it, plus hefty towing fees.

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jimrandomh
> DDOT, citing confidentiality rules in working with construction contractor
> Dean- Facchina, declined a public-records request to provide an item-by-item
> breakdown.

Well, there you have it. The money was stolen by shady construction
contractors. The construction industry in the United States - and seemingly
only in the United States - is incredibly corrupt.

~~~
kps
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charbonneau_Commission](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charbonneau_Commission)

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cphoover
It's the springfield monorail in real life

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Grue3
Berlin has spent much more on an airport you still can't fly from.

~~~
Xylakant
at least we have some working streetcars.

~~~
distances
Indeed, the Berlin tram network is surprisingly fast and convenient.

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andys627
This is nothing compared to what we spend on car infrastructure.

~~~
sokoloff
But at least my car is usable.

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melling
I thought DC was trying to use a wireless streetcar that was developed in
China:

[http://www.npr.org/2015/10/22/450583840/in-d-c-and-china-
two...](http://www.npr.org/2015/10/22/450583840/in-d-c-and-china-two-
approaches-to-a-streetcar-unconstrained-by-wires)

------
funwithjustin
At least they didn't go $6.25 billion over budget on a broken bridge:

[http://www.citylab.com/politics/2015/10/from-250-million-
to-...](http://www.citylab.com/politics/2015/10/from-250-million-
to-65-billion-the-bay-bridge-cost-overrun/410254/)

------
tormeh
Streetcars suck. It's less flexible buses, basically. Subways, on the other
hand...

~~~
chkuendig
Subways are a lot more expensive than streetcars, while buses are cheaper (not
that much once you have a dedicated lane) but slower than streetcars.

PS: I live in a city with an extensive streetcar network which is still
expanding (Zurich)

~~~
xemdetia
I believe the damning thing is that DC already has a fairly reasonable subway
network, so I can't see the need for streetcars.

~~~
apendleton
DC's streetcar and subway systems aren't supposed to address the same need.
The metro system, in terms of station placement/spacing, schedules, line
routes, etc., is designed to efficiently move people from the suburbs to the
core and back again. It's poorly laid out for moving people within the city;
the hub and spoke layout means almost everyone needs to transfer and trips are
often circuitous. For my commute to my last job, for example, getting to work
via metro required walking five blocks, going into downtown, changing lines,
coming back out from downtown, and walking an additional four blocks. It took
45 minutes, vs a half hour just to walk to work or ten minutes to bike, and
this is typical of getting from place to place within the city by metro. Most
people don't bother.

The envisioned broader streetcar network would have been explicitly designed
to address intra-urban trips, and would have had a very different layout from
metro, with stations spaced more closely together, and fewer lines passing
through downtown.

Lots of cities have different systems to address these needs, since it's
difficult or impossible to design a system that does both well.

~~~
PhantomGremlin
_the hub and spoke layout means almost everyone needs to transfer and trips
are often circuitous_

I don't know how well it works in practice, but ever since I saw the map[1]
for the Moscow Metro I've always liked it. Especially the ring that
presumably? keeps people from needing to go thru the core. It probably works
better than most systems. E.g. NYC's subway doesn't do well if you're trying
to get from outer borough to outer borough. Many such trips involve going thru
Manhattan.

[1]
[https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/2c/Moscow_m...](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/2c/Moscow_metro_map_en_sb.svg)

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mrsuprawsm
This would never happen in mainland Europe.

------
tosseraccount
Maybe letting de-regulated private companies run some services will solve the
cost problems.

A little "uber" or "air bnb" type disruption is what mass ground
transportation needs.

~~~
mkaziz
Right up until they have their first pedestrian incident.

~~~
cpursley
Plenty of private industries have incidents. How would this be different?
There's already well-established legal and insurance systems in place to
handle them. Also, privately run infrastructure has more of incentive to have
a safe track (literally) record. Unlike government monopoly, they could loose
a lot of money, lose their contract, or both.

~~~
angdis
Plenty of modern cities with highly functional urban cores do just fine with
public mass transit. DC should be able to do the same.

It is a matter of fixing the right things rather than giving up and handing it
over to private industry. Sadly too many interests in the USA are trigger-
happy about throttling any/all public transit.

~~~
tosseraccount
Doesn’t competition for gasoline, cable tv and phone service keep prices down?
Why can't this work for transportation? Imagine what an Elon Musk could do
with Amtrak or the New York subway.

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hanniabu
Government at it's finest.

You can probably take any random person off the street, put them in as project
manager, and complete this for less. The incompetency the government has in
handling projects is absurd.

~~~
Edmond
probably more to do contracting bureaucracy than incompetence. With all of
these public works projects there are just too many hands in the bowl to make
it efficient. The alternative would be to do it dictatorially, which would not
be acceptable either.

~~~
imglorp
More likely, bureaucracy AND incompetence.

Each begets the other forever.

~~~
PhantomGremlin
_bureaucracy AND incompetence_

You forgot corruption, the third member of the triad.

