Maryland’s Purple line is a deliberate 26.1km (16.2-mile) orbital LRT hyperlink to attach Bethesda and New Carrollton through Silver Spring and Faculty Park within the suburbs north of Washington, DC. Providing interchange with 4 Washington Metro strains, it’ll use a part of the deserted alignment of the previous CSX Georgetown department (since transformed to a pedestrian and bicycle path).
The sunshine rail challenge was permitted in October 2009 and procured as a Public-Non-public Partnership. In March 2016 the Purple Line Transit Companions (PLTP) consortium led by Fluor was chosen to finance, design, construct, equip, function and preserve the road beneath a USD5.6bn 36-year contract; USD168m was to return from the State of Maryland and USD900m from Federal sources. Work started in August 2017 and a fleet of 26 41m double-ended LRVs had been ordered from CAF for USD200m.
Nonetheless, by 2020 the challenge had accrued over USD800m in change orders and the six-year building section had been prolonged by 32 months. Disputes subsequently noticed PLTP select to stroll away from the challenge and after some authorized wrangling, it ceased work in September 2020. Discussions continued behind closed doorways, and on 24 November the State of Maryland and PLTP introduced a USD250m settlement to settle all claims regarding the challenge.
Fluor is leaving the consortium so the Maryland Transit Administration will proceed to handle building whereas a brand new PPP associate is sought.