In their May 6 columns, Steven Pearlstein [“Hostage taking on the Silver Line,” Business] and Robert McCartney [“Two obstacles still threaten Silver Line,” Metro] were spot on in describing the obstacles facing completion of the Silver Line to Dulles Airport and beyond.

Enlightened self-interest should be the guiding rule in working out a compromise, not the rancorous politics of self-destruction that has been evident thus far. With growing gridlock on local highways and a Metrorail extension reaching Reston, it would be sheer folly for Loudoun County’s Republican supervisors to scuttle the extension to make a political point about a union-labor provision in the project’s construction agreement.

Additional considerations for a speedy resolution include the construction jobs the project will bring as well as the economic boost to the area in terms of commerce, housing and, perhaps most important, easing the effect of traffic gridlock on the area’s fastest-growing economy.

Speedy, efficient and reliable transportation is a keystone to economic growth — something that folks regardless of political persuasions should endorse.

Reuben W. Moore Jr., Great Falls

I have read with some dismay the reports by Robert McCartney on Loudoun County officials’ resistance to the Silver Line. This is a perfect example of the political gridlock that Norman J. Ornstein and Thomas E. Mann describe in their new book “It’s Even Worse Than It Looks.”

Perhaps the Silver Line should terminate at Dulles Airport, as the original design for the airport proposed. If that were to happen, the voters of Loudoun County, when they see the resulting development to the east, might deal with their county officials in the election booth.

Charles Whitham, Reston