Wednesday, March 22, 2017

Final Bethesda Metro station replacement escalator scheduled to open this afternoon

A ribbon-cutting this afternoon will mark the reopening of the fifth of five escalators replaced at the Bethesda Metro station. Metro General Manager Paul Wiedefeld, Montgomery County Council President Roger Berliner, and prominent Bethesda realtor Jane Fairweather will cut the ribbon on the mezzanine level of the station at 3:00 PM this afternoon.

Fairweather is also Chair of the Greater Bethesda Chamber of Commerce Metro Improvement Task Force. The escalator project cost Metro $8 million, and replaced 30-year-old escalators, three of which are the second-longest in the Western Hemisphere.

A working escalator at the Bethesda Metro station - now that is news!

12 comments:

Anonymous said...

Is there any plan to restore the linear metal ceiling at the top of the escalators?

Anonymous said...

Dyer is smart to take his picture from the base rather than the top. Otherwise an intelligent Bethesdian would have snuck up behind him and given him a shove.

9:45 - You will need to translate "linear metal" for the "journalist" here.

Skippy said...

Guess who's going to have a picture of Wiedefield, Berliner and Fairweather cutting that ribbon, published at 3:01 p.m. (EDT, that is.)

I can't wait! :)

Anonymous said...

The barriers were up this morning and the workers were cleaning the railings; it looks good.

Anonymous said...

I don't know? Who?

weski said...

Hurray!
How long have they been out of service for replacement? 5-7 years?

Anonymous said...

This project was done efficiently and, amazingly, there were hardly any times in my daily commuting experience where one of the two operating escalators was not working.

Robert Dyer said...

Let's not forget how many times the station shut down during this escalator replacement, requiring riders to use shuttle buses.

Anonymous said...

Well, how many times, Mr. Dyer? It was quite minimal, in my experience using the Bethesda Metro station twice a day, every day of the work week, for more than 10 years. Maybe a handful of incidents, none lasting an entire rush hour, over a two and half year period?

Anonymous said...

How many times?

Robert Dyer said...

6:33: Many more than you experienced. I remember the many announcements. Nobody would have kept track of the exact number, and there's no way to precisely count now - you know that. But definitely not just a handful. If you want to go ahead and praise Barwood Cab, Comcast, and the MVA license renewal experience while you're at it, knock yourself out. You're very much alone in praising WMATA's poor track record.

Anonymous said...

Dyer, you have an infinite capacity for inferring things that absolutely no one has ever said. Not a good trait to have if you expect to be a journalist when you grow up.