The estimated cost of building a connection for passengers to transfer between Metro’s Red Line Bethesda station and the future Purple Line stop nearby has grown by $22.6 million, a Montgomery County official said.
The additional funding to build a mezzanine at a new Metro station entrance would increase the project’s budget by 20 percent. Montgomery has allotted $110.2 million to build a southern entrance to the underground Bethesda Metro station at Wisconsin Avenue and Elm Street, near the western terminus for the street-level Purple Line.
Montgomery is paying for the new Metro station entrance as part of the Maryland Transit Administration’s Purple Line project.
According to the design, Red Line passengers transferring to the Purple Line will head to the southern end of the Bethesda station platform, where an elevator or escalator will take them up to a new mezzanine. They will then use the mezzanine and a short passageway to reach high-speed elevators up to the Purple Line station, which will be in a tunnel beneath a recently built high-rise. Elevators and stairs will connect the Purple Line level to Elm Street above.
Click here to read the rest of the article written by Katherine Shaver over at The Washington Post
