After a long wait, funding is becoming available for much of Flash, Montgomery County’s Bus Rapid Transit network

It’s easy to forget that Montgomery County has long been planning a visionary Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) network intended to change the nature of transportation around the county. After all, the network, since named Flash, was first proposed more than a dozen years ago and it took until 2020 for the first line to open, on the transit-starved Route 29.

The next two parts of the system, on Veirs Mill Road and MD 355, have been in limbo ever since. Given that one of the virtues of BRT is the speed and low cost to build, what’s the hold up?

The good news is that both lines are moving ahead, with projected opening dates of 2027 for Veirs Mill and 2028 for Route 355. The major delay had been funding. The Hogan administration “set the tone pretty early, saying they did not view [BRT] as a state issue,” Maryland State Delegate Marc Korman told me. Despite this, a 2017 Transportation Infrastructure Generating Economic Recovery (TIGER) grant from the federal government allowed the county to move forward with the Route 29 Flash.

Fortunately, the state has been much more forthcoming in 2022.

“What’s changed is the legislature has asserted itself to provide some funding in two ways,” said Korman. Taking advantage of a budget surplus, the legislature passed Senate Bill 291 that provides a one-time boost of $63 million, allowing the county to move forward with the 355 and Veirs Mill lines.

The legislature also secured an annual income stream from lottery revenue of $27 million for BRT across the state (although currently, only Montgomery County has BRT, other counties will likely join in coming years). Joana Conklin, Bus Rapid Transit Program Manager, Montgomery County Department of General Services, credited this to “work by our local delegation and our local county officials, who have really been pushing the state to make more investment in transit.”

The county hopes that federal funding, easier to obtain thanks to the recently passed Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, will be the final piece enabling the projects. After that, a number of steps are needed: obtaining right of way, environmental review, moving of utilities, construction of state-of-the-art bus stations, among others.

“It takes a lot to get through the process once the funding is in place,” said Corey Pitts, Planning Section Chief, Montgomery County Department of Transportation (MCDOT). Still, money is the lubricant that smooths the way. “Until we have funding, we’re kind of doing things piecemeal,” said Conklin.

Paying for three key routes

Of three key routes that will be the beginning of a countywide rapid bus system, the US 29 Flash is up and running. The route, along an underserved corridor, has been long awaited. Indeed, a county summary document describes the US 29 Flash as “vital to the success of significant new private development and employment in the adopted White Oak Science Gateway Master Plan.” The route was relatively inexpensive since little reconstruction of the roadway itself was needed, explained Pitts.

Expenditure to get the 14-mile route going totaled some $31 million, $9 and a half million from federal aid (the TIGER grant), with the bulk of the rest from local funding. A second phase is planned, to add dedicated lanes and other improvements, projected to cost $11 million split between state funding and local sources.

The MD 355 Central route is intended to be 22 miles from Clarksburg to Bethesda, connecting a dense, congested corridor. The Central portion, which will run from Montgomery College - Rockville to Montgomery College – Germantown, is projected to cost some $358 million over eight years, with approximately $190 million through state funding and $158 million through federal aid. The federal money is expected to come through the New Starts program, explained Conklin. This portion of the funding has not yet been appropriated, however the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law increases the likelihood.

“We have a good sense that we’ll be successful, but the actual commitment of federal dollars is going to be crucial,” said Tim Cupples, Acting Director for Transportation Policy, MCDOT. “Without the federal investment, we’re not going to be able to move forward.” The northern and southern portions of the project are still in the design stage and with no funding beyond that, according to Pitts.

The Veirs Mill line, from Montgomery College - Rockville to Wheaton, will bring transportation relief to one of the more underserved parts of the county, a corridor with tremendous demand. The project has recently added an intriguing wrinkle by closely integrating a plan to improve pedestrian and bike mobility along the corridor. “We’re thinking about them all as one project,” said Conklin. The BRT part is projected to cost some $87 million, with federal aid proposed to fund over $42 million of that meant to come from the federal Small Starts program.

Waiting for Flash

The long wait for funding, planning, and construction of BRT has left communities dependent on cars—whether people can afford them or not—or convoluted routes with multiple buses weaving through a sprawling county. “It’s frustrating for it to be so expensive and take so long when people have really acute needs today,” said Jane Lyons, the Maryland Advocacy Manager at the Coalition for Smarter Growth. “It’s still a great goal for the county to work toward, but it shouldn’t detract from short-term changes in the existing bus system that will really improve lives today.” She suggests getting Ride On, the county’s existing bus service, back to pre-pandemic levels as a crucial first step. Beyond that, she calls for more frequent service, as well as “bus lanes in strategic places.” Finally, Lyons points to the Ride On Reimagined project as critical for getting timely relief to frustrated communities.

County officials are thinking along similar lines, working on a variety of projects, notably dedicated bus lanes painted red. Conklin emphasized what the county can “in the shorter term, with less investment and less construction, to provide priority to transit.” She pointed to a project in Germantown that gives buses their own lanes, marked by red paint, as well as potential similar projects on University Boulevard, Veirs Mill and Route 29. The 101 express bus, which started in 2017 to cover a crucial portion of the route that will be traversed by the Flash on MD 355, is also among projects meant to speed up transit while county residents await the complete rapid bus system.