Is MARC’s newest plan to improve service a step backwards?
TRANSIT By Alex Holt (Maryland Correspondent) December 3, 2019

The MARC Cornerstone Plan lays out how the country’s ninth-largest commuter rail system aims to increase ridership and improve reliability and service. However, some say the latest iteration the Maryland Transit Administration (MTA) released in November has no timeline for some important goals, and lacks information that existed in previous versions of the plan.

Goals for MARC include adding third tracks to the CSX-owned Brunswick and Camden lines, introducing weekend and evening service, and increasing midday service. These two commuter rail routes are notoriously busy during rush hour, but lack rush hour trains.

The most recent iteration was supposed to build on previous MARC Cornerstone Plans from 2007 and 2013. Unlike previous versions, the new one doesn’t have any sort of timeline for some of the most crucial tasks such as installing third tracks, MTA representatives revealed at a public forum held by the Washington Suburban Transit Commission (WSTC) in Riverdale Park on November 12.

There’s a lot missing in the new Cornerstone Plan

The new Cornerstone Plan is as notable for what it doesn’t mention (at least in much detail) as for what it does. The Baltimore and Potomac Tunnel, currently one of the main chokepoints on the Penn Line, appears just twice in the plan’s 68 pages—once to note that “based on the location selected” for the new B&P Tunnel, the West Baltimore MARC station “may need to be relocated.”

Continued Brunswick Line service to West Virginia, the subject of repeated controversy and intense negotiations over the past few years, isn’t mentioned at all, nor is the Penn Station Vision Plan currently under development in Baltimore. Pennsylvania Station is a key transit hub for the state, and it badly needs repairs and updates.



Map of rail lines from page 11 of the new MARC Cornerstone Plan.

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