The transit system that serves Baltimore's rich cousin

Metrorail: Washington area's system has the connections needed to work for people.

IT'S A TRANSPORTATION tale of two cities.

These are the best of times for mass transit riders in the Washington area, who can reach city and suburban destinations with ease.

These are far worse times for Baltimore's riders, who miss out on the rapid-rail gravy train.

Washington deserves a first-rate public transportation system because it is the nation's capital. But Baltimore shouldn't trail so far behind its rich cousin that getting around the metropolitan area by public transportation is a chore.

Yet that's the reality - a reality that should change and can change, if state and regional leaders cooperate to build a better system here.

A few positive rapid-transit developments have taken place since a 1999 Sun editorial series illustrated the great gaps in Baltimore's public transportation network:

The 2000 state legislature gave the Mass Transit Administration flexibility to experiment with new routes when it reduced the percentage of revenue the agency must collect from the fare box.

Two recent reports recommended that the state study new rail connections - a downtown light rail loop, an eastern rail connection and a western line.

In a major advance, the governor included money in his budget for these studies. The reports lay out specific improvements that would knit the area's disjointed rail transit services into an effective whole. The downtown loop - which moved a step closer to reality last week when it was included in the state's long-range transit master plan - could be built easily. It would give rail transit in Baltimore renewed momentum. Meanwhile, planners could draw up detailed plans for an east-west route.

Now it will be up to the region's leaders to unite behind these recommendations and see that they happen. Otherwise, the proposals will remain stalled - like Baltimore's light rail trains stuck on a single track.

* * *

If Baltimore's mass transit riders want to hear about the staggering difference between a rapid-rail system that works and their own Toonerville Trolley, they should ask Bill Riley, who raves about the Washington-area system he uses.

A relaxed Mr. Riley, 64, arrived at the Greenbelt Metrorail station for a morning rush-hour train on a sunny summer morning. He had to wait only five minutes at the bustling, orderly station.

The Columbia resident had parked his luxury car in the vast lot, walked past the eight fare-card vending machines inside the station, pushed his card into the automated turnstile and marched upstairs to the platform.

In a couple of minutes he would step onto the computer-controlled train and cruise to his downtown destination, L'Enfant Plaza, in 36 minutes. Enough time to read the newspaper. Or catch of brief nap.

"I'm an inveterate train rider," the bearded Mr. Riley said with a smile. "I really like the flexibility of the Metro train schedule," he said. "I like the speed, and it beats driving by a long shot."

It takes one hour and 15 minutes from his front door to his job. That's about the same time as commuting by car, but who needs the hassle?

He drives only when absolutely necessary. Commuting by car is about as difficult as it was to play basketball in high school against Wilt Chamberlain long ago in Philadelphia. Both are losing propositions.

Mr. Riley grew up riding trains, buses and the trolley in Philly. When he moved to New York in 1972, he sold his car. He relocated to Columbia four years later.

He once took the private Eyre bus, which serves Columbia riders headed for Washington or Baltimore, but he fell in love with the Washington Metrorail, one of the nation's best.

"It's really the whole interlocking rail system," that he loves, said Mr. Riley, director of the nonprofit Family Violence Prevention Services, which funds shelters nationwide for battered women.

* * *

Mr. Riley is among the 600,000 professionals, laborers and tourists who ride Washington's elaborate system daily. It's perhaps the most successful modern mass-transit story in the nation.

Thanks to a generous Congress, Washington's Metrorail grew amazingly fast. Construction began Dec. 9, 1969. The first five stations and 4.2 miles of service - the Red Line - opened March 27, 1976. The Blue Line started in 1977, the Orange Line in 1978, the Yellow Line in 1983 and the Green Line in 1991. A number of extensions came later, and there are more to come. Gov. Parris N. Glendening this year announced plans to spend $434 million extending Metrorail's Blue Line to Largo.

The system stretches in many directions, reaching destinations such as Rockville, Glenmont, Landover and Capitol Heights in Maryland and the northern Virginia suburbs.

Baltimore should be so lucky.

Here, rail transit expansion has been slow and abbreviated. The transit proposals that the new reports are recommending have been kicked around for years while next to nothing has happened.