Officials in the nation's capital want to build a 20-plus-mile network connecting neighborhoods from Georgetown and Takoma to Anacostia, linking richer and poorer communities, giving people an alternative to the automobile and, they argue, spurring development along the routes. Eventually they see a system stretching about 37 miles.
Their effort has been beset by years of delays, blown deadlines and questions about long-term funding. The inaugural 2.2-mile line, on H Street and Benning Road NE, is viewed by some as proof that the concept will work. Others see the opposite.
Just a couple of months before the promised opening of the first streetcar line in the District in half a century, basic questions remain unanswered. Among them: How much will the system impede other traffic? Will there be effective safety oversight? When will fares be collected? And when will service actually start?
During test runs in recent weeks, the first cars on the city's inaugural line, running east of Union Station, have snarled traffic and been in two minor accidents, a shaky start for a throwback mode of transportation that city officials are touting as an efficient means of moving people around the growing 21st-century metropolis.
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http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/trafficandcommuting/key-questions-still-surround-planned-opening-of-dc-streetcar-line/2014/10/22/ed4d23f8-4f19-11e4-8c24-487e92bc997b_story.html
IMO, new fixed rail lines, including streetcars, should be designed to travel in their own ROW or lane from the start. A streetcar sitting in traffic with cars is essentially an expensive bus.....that spurs TOD.