ARRA to fund Maryland MTA parking upgrades

The Maryland Transit Administration (MTA) announced the start of $2.3 million dollars in upgrades at the Falls Road Light Rail stop.

These improvements were funded by President Barack Obama’s American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA). The upgrades to the Falls Road facility follow the completion of conceptual engineering designs that were developed and approved with community input received during a series of public workshop meetings conducted by the MTA.

The Falls Road project has been designed to meet the increased need for parking at the station. Station improvements include increasing parking capacity from 97 spaces to 197 spaces; new lighting, landscaping and signs; and bus access improvements. Construction is expected to be complete in spring 2010.

 
Since ARRA funding became available earlier this spring, Gov. Martin O’Malley announced a series of transit improvement projects made possible with ARRA dollars. These include: the purchase of new hybrid replacement buses for the MTA; the purchase of buses for locally operated transit systems around the state; customer information system improvements at Baltimore Metro Subway and MARC stations, and infrastructure improvements at a variety of MARC stations. All totaled, Maryland will receive $135 million in ARRA funding for transit improvements.