THE DESIRE NAMED STREETCAR: Bowser to replace D.C. Streetcar with ‘next generation streetcar.’ It’s a bus.
After less than a decade of operation, the D.C. Streetcar is set to be phased out and replaced by an electric bus that Mayor Muriel E. Bowser (D) called a “next generation streetcar” when she announced the change Tuesday.
Funding for the streetcar ends after two more years in Bowser’s budget plan. City Administrator Kevin Donahue said at the announcement that the new streetcar would be “essentially buses that utilize” the streetcar system’s existing cables for power. It would make it possible “to more nimbly and quickly expand the streetcar line out beyond where we currently are,” he said.
Local leaders have been pushing buses as the future of the city and regional transportation network, a lower-cost alternative to rail in a time of federal cuts that limit transit funding. The single D.C. Streetcar line, which runs from Union Station to the edge of the RFK Stadium site, took far longer to build than planned.
Former DDOT Director Leif Dormsjo, who helped bring the long-delayed streetcar into service, said “the District and WMATA are cooperating far better than years ago and I’d be encouraged by any future crosstown transit service that has buy-in from Mayor Bowser and GM Randy Clarke.”
A lack of separation from car traffic means double-parkers can block the tracks, making bus service more reliable. After more than a decade and $200 million spent on construction, the streetcar carries a fraction of the number of riders of the express buses that travel the same route.
Unexpectedly! So why didn’t DC simply program a bus route right from the start? Because of the enormous amount of graft that a streetcar system can generate compared to busses: “A transit agency that expands its bus fleet gets the support of the transit operators union. But an agency that builds a rail line gets the support of construction companies, construction unions, banks and bond dealers, railcar manufacturers, electric power companies (if the railcars are electric powered), downtown property owners, and other real estate interests. Rail may be a negative-sum game for the region as a whole, but those concentrated interests stand to gain a lot at a relatively small expense to everyone else.”