REGIONAL BRIEFING

INTERNET SITE

New Areawide Guide to Services

Nonprofit leaders have launched a Web site to help residents find counseling, affordable housing, elder care, food assistance and other services throughout the Washington area.

On the site, http://www.211metrodc.org, users can search 10,000 programs and 4,000 human services organizations, which have agreed to share information in a database that is updated monthly.

Organizers -- the Nonprofit Roundtable of Greater Washington, the United Way of Central Maryland, the Northern Virginia Regional Commission and the D.C. program 211 Answers, Please! -- say it is the first site to bring together information for the entire Washington area.

"We want to match a person's needs with the best services possible, even if those resources are across the District line in Maryland or Virginia or vice versa," said Chuck Bean, executive director of the Nonprofit Roundtable.

Organizers say the site is the first step toward a regional 211 call center that would help residents negotiate the maze of social service and government agencies across the region.

-- Jacqueline L. Salmon

METRO

Orange Line Stations to Be Shut

Major track work on the Orange Line this weekend will close the Cheverly, Landover and New Carrollton stations from 10 p.m. today until midnight Monday. The Orange Line will operate between the Vienna and Deanwood stations. Metro will provide free shuttle service between Deanwood and New Carrollton, with stops at Cheverly and Landover.

Metro will close the stations so it can replace a rail switch outside the Cheverly station. A rail switch, or "interlocking," is an intersection in the track where trains "switch" from one track to another.

-- Steven Ginsberg

So Long, Hexagonal Platform Tile

The Metro board approved a change to the look of tile floors on station platforms yesterday, embracing a 12-inch square tile after 30 years of using a hexagonal tile. Board members decided that the square tile, which will be the same terra cotta color, was the most economical and durable configuration. The new tiles are five inches larger, more slip-resistant and easier to maintain, officials said.

The board also swore in Emeka Moneme, acting director of the D.C. Department of Transportation, as the District's voting representative and Tony Giancola, executive director of the National Association of County Engineers, as the District's second alternate member.

-- Lena H. Sun