Hey Virginia, are you taking notes?

Encouraging transit developments are happening in Maryland these days – mostly revolving around the MARC system. MARC’s facing many of the same challenges that every other local transit system is: booming ridership, infrastructure in need of improvement, less than stellar performance, and waning public confidence. But lo and behold, things aren’t grinding to a halt. First, MARC’s administrator, Paul J. Wiedefeld, admitted that the public deserved a better way to get around – and now his state is following up on that promise. Word is that the state has approved $369 million in improvements for the MARC system, including brand new cars, trains, and tracks. The plan is an ambitious strategy to quadruple ridership from 27,000 to 103,000 by 2035, while keeping service at similar levels to 2006, when every MARC line was running at around 90 percent efficiency.

The cash influx is imperative for the system-at-large. For example, there’s a dedicated section in the MARC FAQ which claims that used train cars purchased from Chicago to replace the currently 50 year old cars in use are “virtual spring chickens.”

Another good sign: MARC is negotiating to try and improve their awkward symbiosis with freight carrier CSX, which owns the tracks that MARC (and Amtrak, for that matter) uses between Baltimore and Washington. And to round out the good news, the approved improvements to MARC come on the heels of the alteration of plans in Maryland to further integrate mass transit into the state’s long-term plans. According to the Baltimore Sun, another $340 million over the next 20 years has been reallocated to transit projects after Marylanders demanded a shift from highway funding.

Photo by yorktronic.