Mixed Views On Changes To Purple Line Study

But Mier Wolf, a council member for the Town of Chevy Chase, said that's not the case for his neighbors.

"It'll be very unpopular in our town," Wolf said of plans to move the tracks to the trail's south side. Wolf is also head of the Greater Bethesda-Chevy Chase Coalition, which works to protect the Capital Crescent Trail.

In addition to having trains or buses running closer to Chevy Chase homes, Wolf said, he's concerned that residents will have a hard time getting to the trail if they first have to cross over tracks. Any transit line between Bethesda and Silver Spring, he said, should be tunneled or built beyond or near the Capital Beltway to better serve areas such as the National Naval Medical Center. The campus, just north of downtown Bethesda, is expected to generate more traffic under military plans to expand it after closing Walter Reed Army Medical Center in the District.

Even then, Wolf said, he questions whether ridership forecasts will be high enough to clinch scarce federal money to build it.

Transit officials are still considering a proposal that would begin the Purple Line at the Medical Center Metro station and run it along Jones Bridge Road, Madden said. However, that route is only being considered for rapid bus transit, not a train.

Especially challenging to planners has been finding ways to build the line through downtown Silver Spring, Madden said. Besides being densely developed, the city has no preserved right of way, as there is between Bethesda and Silver Spring. The area east of downtown is also hilly, in some cases too steep for an aboveground light-rail train to run safely, he said. In other areas, the transit line would have to run above or below congested intersections, he said.

Transit officials are no longer considering running the line along Brookville Road in the Forest Glen Park area of Silver Spring because of too much vehicle traffic and the potential impact on businesses. They also have eliminated one possible route east of downtown Silver Spring, which would have run along or below Sligo Avenue. Madden said planners determined that doing so would be too disruptive to the neighborhood.

A Purple Line is estimated to cost between $360 million and $1.6 billion, depending on whether it would be a bus or rail system and how much tunneling would be required. The state's draft environmental impact study, which is evaluating different routes and the relative merits of light rail and rapid bus systems, is scheduled to be completed next spring. The state is scheduled to hold open houses to share information with the public this fall. If the project receives federal funding, it would not open until at least the summer of 2015, Madden said.