The Forums

Purpose and Need
To evaluate, and ultimately construct and operate, a safe, revenue-producing, high-speed ground transportation system that achieves the optimum operating speed of the SCMAGLEV technology to significantly reduce travel time to meet the capacity and ridership needs of the Baltimore-Washington region.
Project objectives include:
•Redundancy and mobility options for transportation between Baltimore and Washington, D.C.
•Connectivity to existing transportation modes in the region (e.g., heavy rail, light rail, bus, air).
•Complementary alternative to future rail expansion opportunities on adjacent corridors.
•Local and regional economic growth.

The high-speed superconducting magnetic levitation system, many say, offers little benefit to communities in the D.C. area because it would stop only in Washington, Baltimore and at Baltimore-Washington International Marshall Airport.

But construction would have a direct impact on the neighborhoods in between those stops. Heavy machinery has already been brought in along the route where soil testing is being done to check conditions for tunneling or supporting viaducts, project officials said. Emergency exits and ventilation stations would go in some of those towns, requiring drilling as deep as 150 feet.
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Planned as the first leg of a system that would move people between Washington and New York in an hour, the 40-mile rail line between the District and Baltimore could cost between $10 billion and $12 billion, of which Northeast Maglev has said it has secured $5 billion from Japan.

The Federal Railroad Administration is conducting a study of the environmental impacts and a draft is expected in early 2020, with a final recommendation also this year. The review, however, was paused to give Northeast Maglev time to answer questions about its design and engineering.

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Proponents also estimate the project will create 74,000 construction jobs during the seven-year building period and 1,500 permanent positions once the system is operational.
Several powerful business and labor groups have announced support for the project, citing the jobs and economic development potential.

The Federal Railroad Administration has halted its analysis of the proposed train to give proponents time to provide more details about its design and engineering.
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“FRA has decided to ‘pause’ the EIS so that work does not have to be redone once the engineering inputs are finalized,” Henson said in an email, referring questions regarding the status of the project to Northeast Maglev.
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The FRA, in partnership with the Maryland Department of Transportation, has been leading a federally mandated environmental review of the project through which it evaluates potential impacts on the communities along the proposed route. Project officials now say they anticipate a draft of the environmental impact statement in the first half of 2020, followed by another public comment period. It could be a year before the final report deciding the fate of the project is issued.