Round-Robin' Orange/Blue Lines?

[Scrabbleship]

I've wanted to ask this for a while, but there hasn't been a real forum to bring up something so obscure.

In the book Transit Maps of the World, inside the WMATA section there is a map from 1982 as one of the historical examples. On this map, the Orange and Blue Lines are together shown in a round-robin arrangement which had some Blues starting at New Carrollton and some Oranges starting at Addison Road with arrows showing the flow. I can't read any of the notes on the map (I can make out a "Trains marked [Terminal in Color]" serve all stops between [Start] and [Terminal]") since it's been shrunk to size, but is there any story behind this? I always thought that when the Orange Line expanded westward into Virgina both lines kept apart outside of the Rosslyn/Stadium-Armory trunk line.

What might have been the case for such a weird service pattern? And if it really was in practice, when did it end?

[coneyraven]

This is an easy one....
After the Blue opened to Addison in 1980, trains ran from either Addison to National Airport or New Carrollton to Ballston (like normal) --- but, during this time, due to a car shortage, they realized that this was rather inefficient, the Orange had higher usage on the New Carrollton end and the Blue had higher usage on the National Airport end, so, in the name of efficiency, trains ran from either National Airport to New Carrollton, or, from Ballston to Addison Road....
As for when did this end, well, to my recollection, the Yellow Line opened in 1981 between Gallery Place and National Airport, so, if my memory is correct, the routings corrected themselves right around this time.

[Scrabbleship]

This is an easy one....
After the Blue opened to Addison in 1980, trains ran from either Addison to National Airport or New Carrollton to Ballston (like normal) --- but, during this time, due to a car shortage, they realized that this was rather inefficient, the Orange had higher usage on the New Carrollton end and the Blue had higher usage on the National Airport end, so, in the name of efficiency, trains ran from either National Airport to New Carrollton, or, from Ballston to Addison Road....
As for when did this end, well, to my recollection, the Yellow Line opened in 1981 between Gallery Place and National Airport, so, if my memory is correct, the routings corrected themselves right around this time.

Thanks! It must have been somewhat confusing for riders and out-of-towners to get around though at that point most of those riders weren't straying from the Rosslyn/Stadium-Armory core.  How were the car length assignments between the two lines at that point? Somehow I'm getting the vision of a single pair of rollsigned Rohrs handling Ballston-Addison Road.

Also, wasn't this the same car shortage that led to the Yellow going to Huntington rather than Franconia and/or Springfield (this before the two turned into one)?

The dearth of historical WMATA maps online makes me wonder about how some other things were handled; I'm relatively new to the area so it's new to me.

• Did the planned Rosecroft terminal of the Green Line ever appear on maps?
• When did the maps stop showing the Blue Line to Huntington?
• When did the separate legs to separate Franconia and Springfield stations stop showing? I know the 1982 map has both.
• How was the Green Line Commuter Shortcut handled on the maps?

[Perry]

The Green Line shortcut was awesome.  If I remember WMATA affixed a green strip on the red line portion between Fort Totten and Farragut North.

Rosecroft I believe was on the earlier version of the maps on the rail cars.

The Orange/Blue split I don't think was too difficult because you just boarded a train on the side you were waiting to take you to where  you were going.  If you were in between Rosslyn and Stadium Armory it didn't matter and if you did, the maps were depicted as such and you just knew if you were headed into DC from VA you took the Blue and the opposite if you were coming from MD into DC. 

[Tristan]

To take advantage of the opportunity...

We wish to solve the problem Scrabbleship brought up in terms of maps being hard to find, so if you have any maps you'd like to either donate or just allow us to photograph, please contact us at info@dctransit.info!

[Scrabbleship]

The Green Line shortcut was awesome.  If I remember WMATA affixed a green strip on the red line portion between Fort Totten and Farragut North.

This line alone has me wishing that I could have ridden it! The only thing is did anything have to suffer in terms of headways on the Fort Totten-Wheaton (later Glenmont) part of the Red Line? Those Green Line Shortcut trains couldn't have been shoehorned in amidst the regular trains and the Grosvenor-Silver Spring short-turns with all three running on the same tracks.[/quote]

Rosecroft I believe was on the earlier version of the maps on the rail cars.

It must have been up for only a couple of years. The 1976 map that's in The Great Society Subway has the Green Line terminating at Branch Avenue and the 1982 map has Branch Avenue as well.
On this note, when did the lines for the Mid-City alignment between U Street and Fort Totten gain its current shape? The 1982 map still has its original straight line alignment rather than what eventually was adopted.

And to Tristan, thanks for the call for old maps! The only "retro" map that is easy to find online is a 2003 map from after when Mt. Vernon Square swapped "UDC" for "7th St-Convention Center" but before Summmerfield became Morgan Blvd.

[coneyraven]

Alrighty now....First of all, I have a wall map showing the Green Line to Rosecroft, so YES, it was on maps for a short period of time.  Tristan, you all saw it during the subtalk field trip several years ago when we got off at Grosvenor and walked to my car....anybody with pictures of it, we had a group photo done around it hat day?  If not, I'll have to take picturesof all my wall maps, I have several from different periods of the systems growth.
Now for when the Yellow to Huntington started showing up.  I have a framed wall map from 1986 showing Yellow going to both Huntington AND Franconia with the Blue terminating at National Airport.
Speaking of Springfield, after the Burke alignment was eliminated, for a short time, there was a planned Springfield station along the current alignment just south of the beltway (with the terminus just being called Franconia)....this station appeared on maps in the late 70's -- when it was removed, I don't recall.

[WMATAGMOAGH]

The only map that shows the Green Line shortcut on the map is the July 4, 1999 map.  The Green Line shortcut never appeared on any maps, but there was a sticker affixed to the map panel describing the surface.  Similar labels were also affixed to pylons at the necessary stations, no strip maps were ever changed.

Generally, there were 3 Red Line trains for every Green Line.  Some delays did occur on the common stretch, but after some experience, they also adjusted the schedules to make things work a bit more smoothly. 

No map showed the Blue Line to Huntington after 1983 when the Yellow Line began operating there.  In 1991, the J route became Blue and the note about the services being swapped in the future disappeared.

[Scrabbleship]

I'm necroposting this, but I found two interesting images on Flickr that might refuel this topic.

On the wall of one of Rocklands BBQ's locations (not Glover Park) hangs a 1983 map with the round-robin arrangement running AFTER the Yellow Line opened to National Airport.

"Your (geographically accurate!) Guide to Metrorail" dated November 1983 with Huntington preemptively listed

If the Yellow Line was opened in truncated form early to take pressure off the Blue Line, why did the round-robin arrangement last? Super car shortage before the 2000's came in?

[Sand Box John]

Scrabbleship
If the Yellow Line was opened in truncated form early to take pressure off the Blue Line, why did the round-robin arrangement last? Super car shortage before the 2000's came in?

Actually it wasn't the Yellow line that was truncated. Take another look at the "round-robin" map, You will notice the Yellow line is shown as future to both Huntington and Springfield-Franconia. Earlier maps showed the Yellow line as future to *Franconia and the Blue line as future to Huntington. What was truncated was the Blue line.

When the C Route between National Airport and Huntington was ready to open WMATA did not have enough cars in the fleet to extend the Blue line to Huntington, they had enough to extended the Yellow line, so they did that instead. The original service pattern south of National Airport was Blue line Addison Road - Huntington, Yellow line Greenbelt - *Franconia / Backlick Road.

None of the 2k cars had been excepted for revenue service when service was opened to Huntington. They made their public debut at the Huntington station on opening day in the form of a parked train on track C2 with the doors opened so people could see what they looked like in side.

*The original 1968 ARS had the J Route running from C and J Junction to where the VRE Backlick Road station is today. The H route followed the present route of today's Blue line to Franconia from a junction north of the Capitol Beltway.. The Franconia station was to located on the north side of Franconia Road. In the late 1970s Fairfax County and the Virginia Department of Rail and Public Transportation decided to modify the alignments of the J and H Routes west of Van Dorn Street. The J route to Backlick Road was deleted and the H Route was extended to where the Springfield-Franconia station is today. The Route of the Blue line today from C and J Junction to Springfield-Franconia is now labeled the J Route.

[NewFlyer9736BCT]

I'm necroposting this, but I found two interesting images on Flickr that might refuel this topic.

On the wall of one of Rocklands BBQ's locations (not Glover Park) hangs a 1983 map with the round-robin arrangement running AFTER the Yellow Line opened to National Airport.

"Your (geographically accurate!) Guide to Metrorail" dated November 1983 with Huntington preemptively listed

If the Yellow Line was opened in truncated form early to take pressure off the Blue Line, why did the round-robin arrangement last? Super car shortage before the 2000's came in?

For that first link, how come Glenmont was shown even when it didn't open until 1998? That's a long while away from 1983, unless I'm missing some facts...

[SchuminWeb]

If not mistaken, Metro always displayed the entire planned system on the map, even if construction wasn't even close to being started in some parts.  Note that the Green Line mid-city segment (opened 1999) and the line to Branch Avenue (the last five stations of which didn't open until 2001) are shown on there as well.

[WMATAGMOAGH]

If not mistaken, Metro always displayed the entire planned system on the map, even if construction wasn't even close to being started in some parts.  Note that the Green Line mid-city segment (opened 1999) and the line to Branch Avenue (the last five stations of which didn't open until 2001) are shown on there as well.

You are correct.  The first map to not have any under construction segments shown is the December 2004 system map.  Largo and NY Ave both showed up on the January 2001 map for the first time IIRC, but I also recall seeing a map at the Glenmont mezzanine the day after the station opened in 1998 with the Largo line included in some fashion (not as a under construction segment, it was marked as something else, no photo, sorry). 

[SchuminWeb]

Then once the first phase of Silver opens (or if there's a service change before that), I suppose we'll get under-construction lines on there again.

[Sand Box John]

SchuminWeb
Then once the first phase of Silver opens (or if there's a service change before that), I suppose we'll get under-construction lines on there again.

That is likely what WMATA will do. two map printings. First printing Wiehle Avenue, Route 722 (Ryan Road Ashburn) future. Second printing Route 722 (Ryan Road Ashburn).