Quote:
Originally posted by Ex_post_Festo
I recall that the board's disdain for long names was the lead objection to renaming the the Ronald Reagan Nat'l Airport station. They seem to have gotten past that. The other objection was the cost. Funny that they have no problem forking over the $100,000 each for new signage to add Penn Quarter or Brentwood names. Let me see: $100,000 to have the name of the station reflect the name of the airport it's located at is too much; $200,000 to add the name of a neighborhood that you'd likely have to take a cab to get to after getting off the train, no problem.
Thanks, Chief. That one post put the brakes on my train of thought that I might like to return to the DC area.
-epF
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I forget the exact details, but the Reagan airport thing went beyond Metro. Each locality gets the rights to approve the name, and Arlington county (where the airport is) refused to spend the money. Meanwhile, Bob Barr, who at the time was the chairman of the relevant committee that oversaw Metro (maybe the DC committee, and maybe not barr), was hell-bent on having it renamed. So he held up appropriations bills and hauled the metro boss before his committee to berate him. ultimately there was some behind-the-scenes negotiation that allowed the renaming through arlington dropping its objection.
My real issue is that a lot of the names do nothing to describe the location. What is "Penn Quarter"? I doubt 90% of DCers could tell you where that is. What does it add to the description? Station names have gone from being easy locators to complex political statements (see,
e.g., U Street/African-American Civil War Memorial/Cardozo). Does telling me all the sights at a given station really help me locate it? I think not.
