Wes Moore administration to announce Baltimore Red Line will be light rail

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Gov. Wes Moore is expected to announce Friday that the reignited east-west Baltimore Red Line project will be a light rail system, according to a state senator and two others familiar with the decision who spoke on the condition of anonymity.

UPDATE: With Red Line mode settled, MD officials to debate route, further push for federal funding

The decision appears to end consideration of building a new bus network that Baltimore lawmakers, business leaders and community organizers had opposed for months.

State officials have said that people had misconceptions about bus rapid transit and drew distinctions between that model and the city’s existing bus lanes, but they appear to have abandoned the idea.

State lawmakers representing the city said Thursday that several questions remain, including about how much it will cost, how it will be paid for, the type of light rail system the state will build, exactly what route it will follow and to what extent it will run underground.

“It’s a good first step forward,” Sen. Cory McCray, a Baltimore city Democrat, said in a phone interview Thursday of the administration’s decision on a mode of transportation.

It’s especially unclear how the state will pay for future stages of the project at a time when transportation officials and legislators are already facing large projected funding gaps in their long-term capital transportation plan.

Officials with the Maryland Transit Administration have said that they expect the project to take between six and 12 years to complete and cost upwards of $7.2 billion, depending on the mode of transportation, extent of tunneling and route on which officials decide.

Sen. Antonio Hayes, a fellow Baltimore city Democrat, said he’s excited about the progress the Moore administration has made since reviving the project last summer.

Baltimore residents and organizations have awaited an east-west transit system for decades.

Plans for the Red Line began in 2002 and progressed slowly until 2015, when Republican former Gov. Larry Hogan — now a Republican nominee for U.S. Senate — returned more than $900 million in federal funding and halted the project. The state had also settled on a light rail system.

Hayes said in a phone interview Thursday that public transportation in Baltimore has historically been built with north-to-south routes, offering transportation into and out of the city but neglecting to connect the city’s east and west sides and leaving majority Black communities who rely on transit to get to school, work, church and more — like those in areas of West Baltimore that Hayes represents — without reliable options.

In building the Red Line, Hayes said he expects the state to minimize disruptions to and displacement of residents and businesses in the historically disinvested communities that the light rail is expected to connect.

The Red Line is expected to eventually run from the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services headquarters in Woodlawn through West Baltimore and into downtown Baltimore before ending in the Bayview area.

Friday’s announcement will represent perhaps the most significant decision in advancing the project since the governor resuscitated it.

The state has also approved an engineering contract of up to $100 million with Gannett Fleming, which will oversee planning and preliminary engineering tasks, and manage technical work completed by a separate general engineering consultant, for three projects, including the Red Line.

Gannett Fleming, which has offices across the U.S., including in Baltimore and Owings Mills, and in Canada and Qatar, will also develop and monitor project budgets and schedules.

Compared to a Red Line bus rapid transit network, a light-rail system has been projected to have nearly double the ridership, including among households without a car, but it could cost billions of dollars more, take years longer to complete and cost the state about $20 million more annually in operation and maintenance expenses, according to the Maryland Transit Administration.

The light rail, though, would be a more cost effective option, saving the state money in annual capital costs per trip compared to bus rapid transit.

“It’s a long-term investment for the city of Baltimore and for Maryland,” Del. Courtney Watson, a Howard County Democrat and chair of a House subcommittee on transportation, said in a phone interview. “This solution is more long-lasting and sustainable.”

An end-to-end trip would take about the same amount of time on light rail as it would on a bus, but city and county residents have had a clear preference.

(This story has been updated.)