Metro Silver Line: Maybe Really the End of the Line?

After winning an extension last month to finish up some paperwork and maybe collate it and put it in a nice plastic binder from Staples so it can be filed and ignored by the Federal Transit Authority, time may be running out for Metro's awesome Silver Line extension, which would give commuters an awesome monorail ride through the architectural wonderland of Tysons Tegucigalpa before encountering a track fire somewhere near Wolf Trap and getting disgorged along the median of the Toll Road.

With the end of the month looming, officials for the Dulles Rail Project are busy working with the Federal Transit Authority to get the project approved before the current construction contract expires.

That situation could seem familiar because at the end of January all of those players were in the exact same position, until they agreed to a one-month extension in the contract, giving everyone involved more time to win over the FTA.

Now, that extension is about to expire, and sources close to the process say that the upcoming contract deadline has motivated a more intense effort to get a resolution for the foundering rail project.

The FTA could issue some sort of decision by Friday, but uncertainty over the dispensation of the $900 million in federal dollars needed for the project's current design has made life difficult for those working on the project.

People have said that the constant delays show that the Feds hate mass transit, because they want everyone to drive their polluting H2s everywhere. But they recently funded a new subway line in New York City to the tune of $2 billion -- that's almost enough to pay for all the orange construction signs they're putting up in Tysons Tegucigalpa! What do those New York City elitists have that the Dulles corridor doesn't? Let's consider:

New York City	Dulles corridor
Empire State bldg.	Reston International Center (and Chili's)
United Nations	Herndon: Center of Tolerance
AOL Headquarters	AOL Headquarters
Statue of Liberty	Statue of Robert E. Simon
Broadway	Baron Cameron Avenue
Hot dog vendors	Macaroni Grill