A stretch of 12th Street S. in Pentagon City will be off-limits to drivers for about a year as the county extends a bus rapid transit corridor.
Closing the street during the expansion will be safer and allow the work to be completed more quickly, county staff said during a March 11 briefing of the county’s Transit Advisory Committee.
The work, which will take place between S. Eads Street and S. Fern Street, is not expected to impact pedestrian access. Parking garages for buildings fronting 12th Street will be accessible via side streets.
The undertaking will continue the westward march of the Crystal City Potomac Yard Transitway. It adds 1.1 miles of upgraded transit facilities to the current 4.5-mile portion between the Braddock Road Metro station and Crystal City.
The new phase of construction will transform the affected stretch of 12th Street. One lane in each direction will be reserved for the exclusive use of Metroway buses — operated by Metrobus — with the others available for other vehicles.
Two sheltered transit stations, one for each travel direction, will be located in the median near the intersection of 12th Street S. and S. Elm Street. There also will be a new traffic light at that intersection, along with roadway and pedestrian upgrades along the route.
Once construction starts in the coming months, it should take 12 months to complete, said Diana Isaza, who is serving as project manager.
At the Tuesday meeting, committee chair John Carten asked Isaza how much time adding dedicated bus lanes would save riders through the corridor.
She, and the county government’s transit chief Pierre Holloman, said there is no way to be sure, since the new route through the area would be different from the current MW1 used by Metroway buses.
“Because the section is brand new, it would be difficult to forecast,” Isaza said.
“It does save time,” Holloman said, “but to compare it to today is hard.”
West of S. Fern Street, Metroway buses will share lanes with vehicular traffic until reaching S. Hayes Street near the Pentagon City Metro station.
Funding for the project comes primarily from the Northern Virginia Transportation Authority and Virginia Department of Rail and Public Transportation.
Future plans call for the Metroway network to jog north on S. Hayes Street, connecting to a planned Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority transit facility at Army Navy Drive, staff said.
