The Metropolitan Subdivision is a

railroad Rail transport (also known as train transport) is a means of transport that transfers passengers and goods on wheeled vehicles running on rails, which are incorporated in tracks. In contrast to road transport, where the vehicles run on a pre ...

line owned and operated by

CSX Transportation CSX Transportation , known colloquially as simply CSX, is a Class I freight railroad operating in the Eastern United States and the Canadian provinces of Ontario and Quebec. The railroad operates approximately 21,000 route miles () of track. ...

in the

District of Columbia ) , image_skyline = , image_caption = Clockwise from top left: the Washington Monument and Lincoln Memorial on the National Mall, United States Capitol, Logan Circle, Jefferson Memorial, White House, Adams Morgan, ...

and the U.S. state of

Maryland Maryland ( ) is a state in the Mid-Atlantic region of the United States. It shares borders with Virginia, West Virginia, and the District of Columbia to its south and west; Pennsylvania to its north; and Delaware and the Atlantic Ocean to ...

. The 79-mile line runs from

Washington, D.C. ) , image_skyline = , image_caption = Clockwise from top left: the Washington Monument and Lincoln Memorial on the National Mall, United States Capitol, Logan Circle, Jefferson Memorial, White House, Adams Morgan, ...

, northwest to

Weverton, Maryland Weverton is an unincorporated community hamlet located in the southern tip of Washington County, Maryland, United States, near the north shore of the Potomac River. Its population is about 500. Weverton is located at the intersection of MD Route ...

, along the former Metropolitan Branch of the

Baltimore and Ohio Railroad The Baltimore and Ohio Railroad was the first common carrier railroad and the oldest railroad in the United States, with its first section opening in 1830. Merchants from Baltimore, which had benefited to some extent from the construction of ...

.CSX Transportation
"Northern Region, Baltimore Division, Timetable No. 4."
Effective 2005-01-01. At its southeast end, north of

Union Station A union station (also known as a union terminal, a joint station in Europe, and a joint-use station in Japan) is a railway station at which the tracks and facilities are shared by two or more separate railway companies, allowing passengers to ...

, the Metropolitan Subdivision meets the

Capital Subdivision The Capital Subdivision is a railroad line owned and operated by CSX Transportation in the U.S. state of Maryland and the District of Columbia. The line runs from near Baltimore, Maryland, southwest to Washington, D.C., along the former Baltimor ...

(formerly called the B&O Washington Branch) and

Amtrak The National Railroad Passenger Corporation, Trade name, doing business as Amtrak () , is the national Passenger train, passenger railroad company of the United States. It operates inter-city rail service in 46 of the 48 contiguous United Stat ...

Northeast Corridor The Northeast Corridor (NEC) is an electrified railroad line in the Northeast megalopolis of the United States. Owned primarily by Amtrak, it runs from Boston through Providence, New Haven, Stamford, New York City, Philadelphia, Wilmington, a ...

. It meets the

Old Main Line Subdivision The Old Main Line Subdivision is a railroad line owned and operated by CSX Transportation in the U.S. state of Maryland. The line runs from Relay (outside Baltimore) west to Point of Rocks, and was once the main line of the Baltimore and Ohio Ra ...

Point of Rocks, Maryland Point of Rocks is an unincorporated community and census-designated place (CDP) in Frederick County, Maryland, United States. As of the 2010 census it had a population of 1,466. It is named for the striking rock formation on the adjacent Catoct ...

. At its northwest end in Weverton, the line joins the Cumberland Subdivision.

MARC Train MARC (Maryland Area Rail Commuter) is a commuter rail system in the Baltimore–Washington metropolitan area. MARC is administered by the Maryland Transit Administration (MTA) and operated under contract by Alstom and Amtrak on track owned b ...

Brunswick Line The Brunswick Line is a MARC commuter rail line between Washington, D.C., and Martinsburg, West Virginia, with a branch to Frederick, Maryland. It primarily serves the northern and western suburbs of Washington. The line, MARC's second longest ...

uses the entire subdivision, as does

's ''

Capitol Limited The ''Capitol Limited'' is a daily Amtrak train between Washington, D.C., and Chicago, running via Pittsburgh and Cleveland. Service began in 1981 and was named after the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad's ''Capitol Limited'' which ended in 197 ...

''. The Red Line of the

Washington Metro The Washington Metro (or simply Metro), formally the Metrorail,Google Books search/preview

shares right-of-way with the subdivision along two separate stretches in Maryland and D.C.: from the junction with the Capital Subdivision to north of Silver Spring, and from south of Twinbrook to the end of the Red Line at Shady Grove.

History

Interest in building a new rail line from Washington to points west was initially generated by businessmen in Washington and

Montgomery County, Maryland Montgomery County is the most populous county in the state of Maryland. As of the 2020 census, the county's population was 1,062,061, increasing by 9.3% from 2010. The county seat and largest municipality is Rockville, although the census-design ...

. In 1853 they obtained a corporate charter from the

Maryland General Assembly The Maryland General Assembly is the state legislature of the U.S. state of Maryland that convenes within the State House in Annapolis. It is a bicameral body: the upper chamber, the Maryland Senate, has 47 representatives and the lower chamb ...

to form the

Metropolitan Railroad The Metropolitan Railroad was the second streetcar company to operate in Washington, D.C., United States. It was incorporated and started operations in 1864, running from the Capitol to the War Department and along H Street NW in downtown. It a ...

. The proposed line would run from Washington to the vicinity of

Frederick, Maryland Frederick is a city in and the county seat of Frederick County, Maryland. It is part of the Baltimore–Washington Metropolitan Area. Frederick has long been an important crossroads, located at the intersection of a major north–south Native ...

, where it would connect with the B&O main line, and continue to

Hagerstown, Maryland Hagerstown is a city in Washington County, Maryland, United States and the county seat of Washington County. The population of Hagerstown city proper at the 2020 census was 43,527, and the population of the Hagerstown metropolitan area (exten ...

. The company conducted some initial land surveys, but had difficulty raising funds and went bankrupt in 1863. Two years later, the expired charter was taken over by the B&O, which had not previously been interested in building a new route out of Washington. Construction began in 1866 along a slightly different route, connecting with the main line at

. The line opened on April 30, 1873, as the B&O's Metropolitan Branch. The new line became the B&O's main passenger route to Washington, with the Old Main Line, from Point of Rocks to Relay, reduced to secondary status. Some through

freight Cargo consists of bulk goods conveyed by water, air, or land. In economics, freight is cargo that is transported at a freight rate for commercial gain. ''Cargo'' was originally a shipload but now covers all types of freight, including transp ...

trains were also rerouted to the new line. Increasing congestion led the B&O to start adding

double track A double-track railway usually involves running one track in each direction, compared to a single-track railway where trains in both directions share the same track. Overview In the earliest days of railways in the United Kingdom, most lin ...

portions to the line in 1886. The Washington-to-

Gaithersburg Gaithersburg ( ), officially the City of Gaithersburg, is a city in Montgomery County, Maryland, United States. At the time of the 2020 U.S. Census, Gaithersburg had a population of 69,657, making it the ninth-largest location in the state. Ga ...

section was double-tracked by 1893. During the peak years of passenger operation, 1893 to the 1920s, the line saw 18 trains per day, with as many as 28 stops along the Met Branch. Double-tracking was completed on the remainder of the branch in 1928. Several distinctive

passenger station A train station, railway station, railroad station or depot is a railway facility where trains stop to load or unload passengers, freight or both. It generally consists of at least one platform, one track and a station building providing such ...

s, designed by architect

Ephraim Francis Baldwin Ephraim Francis Baldwin (October 4, 1837 – January 20, 1916) was an American architect, best known for his work for the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad and for the Roman Catholic Church. Personal life Although born in Troy, New York, Baldwin liv ...

, were constructed along the line. Original stations still stand at Rockville (moved away from the tracks in 1981),

Kensington Kensington is a district in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea in the West End of London, West of Central London. The district's commercial heart is Kensington High Street, running on an east–west axis. The north-east is taken up b ...

, Dickerson, and Point of Rocks. In 1906, a rear collision at Terra Cotta station killed 53 people. On February 16, 1996, the collision of two trains in Silver Spring killed three crew members and eight passengers and injured a total of 26 people.

Georgetown Branch

left, 200px, Georgetown branch in Bethesda, Maryland, near where it crossed Bethesda Ave The Georgetown Branch ran from a junction north of the

Silver Spring station Silver Spring is a Washington Metro and MARC Train station in Montgomery County, Maryland on the Red Line and Brunswick Line. On the Metro, Silver Spring is the first station in Maryland of the eastern end of the Red Line, and is the second- ...

in a broad 11-mile arc to the Georgetown area of Washington, D.C. The branch was built between 1892 and 1910. It was originally intended to be a B&O extension that would cross the

Potomac River The Potomac River () drains the Mid-Atlantic United States, flowing from the Potomac Highlands into Chesapeake Bay. It is long,U.S. Geological Survey. National Hydrography Dataset high-resolution flowline dataThe National Map. Retrieved Augus ...

near the

Chain Bridge A chain bridge is a historic form of suspension bridge for which chains or eyebars were used instead of wire ropes to carry the bridge deck. A famous example is the Széchenyi Chain Bridge in Budapest. Construction types are, as for other suspen ...

, but in 1904, the B&O reached an agreement with the

Pennsylvania Railroad The Pennsylvania Railroad (reporting mark PRR), legal name The Pennsylvania Railroad Company also known as the "Pennsy", was an American Class I railroad that was established in 1846 and headquartered in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. It was named ...

to use the

Long Bridge Long may refer to: Measurement * Long, characteristic of something of great duration * Long, characteristic of something of great length * Longitude (abbreviation: long.), a geographic coordinate * Longa (music), note value in early music mens ...

over the Potomac, nearly six miles downstream. So the B&O used the Georgetown Branch as a spur to serve local industries in Silver Spring,

Chevy Chase Cornelius Crane "Chevy" Chase (; born October 8, 1943) is an American comedian, actor and writer. He became a key cast member in the first season of ''Saturday Night Live'', where his recurring ''Weekend Update'' segment became a staple of the ...

, Bethesda, and Georgetown. Engineering features that were built on the branch included the Rock Creek Trestle in Chevy Chase, the Dalecarlia Tunnel, and a

through-truss A truss bridge is a bridge whose load-bearing superstructure is composed of a truss, a structure of connected elements, usually forming triangular units. The connected elements (typically straight) may be stressed from tension (mechanics), tensi ...

bridge over the

Chesapeake and Ohio Canal The Chesapeake and Ohio Canal, abbreviated as the C&O Canal and occasionally called the "Grand Old Ditch," operated from 1831 until 1924 along the Potomac River between Washington, D.C. and Cumberland, Maryland. It replaced the Potomac Canal, ...

. CSX abandoned the Georgetown Branch in 1986, with the last train running in June 1985, and the spur is now accessible to the public as the

Capital Crescent Trail The Capital Crescent Trail (CCT) is a , shared-use rail trail that runs from Georgetown in Washington, D.C., to Bethesda, Maryland. An extension of the trail from Bethesda to Silver Spring along a route formerly known as the Georgetown Branch ...

. The Bethesda-to-Silver Spring portion of the spur is also providing a

right-of-way Right of way is the legal right, established by grant from a landowner or long usage (i.e. by prescription), to pass along a specific route through property belonging to another. A similar ''right of access'' also exists on land held by a gov ...

for the Purple Line light rail system, which has been under construction since 2017. The Rock Creek trestle was demolished and is being replaced by new bridges to support the light rail tracks and the bicycle trail.

Current operation

Through mergers, the line became part of the CSX system in 1987. CSX organized its Metropolitan Subdivision as a combination of the original B&O Met Branch plus a section of the B&O original main line northwest of Point of Rocks, which had opened in 1834. The entire subdivision is signaled for bi-directional running. There is a

spur A spur is a metal tool designed to be worn in pairs on the heels of riding boots for the purpose of directing a horse or other animal to move forward or laterally while riding. It is usually used to refine the riding aids (commands) and to ba ...

that services the

Dickerson Generating Station The Dickerson Generating Station is an 853 MW electric generating plant owned by NRG Energy, located approximately two miles west of Dickerson, Maryland. Description The facility consists of three 182 MW coal-fired steam generating plants, two 1 ...

(formerly owned by the

Potomac Electric Power Company The Potomac Electric Power Company (PEPCO) is an American utility company that supplies electric power to the city of Washington, D.C. and to surrounding communities in Maryland. It is owned by Exelon. The company's current trademarked slogan ...

(PEPCO)) at Dickerson, and a trash-transfer facility spur at Derwood. The

interlocking In railway signalling, an interlocking is an arrangement of signal apparatus that prevents conflicting movements through an arrangement of tracks such as junctions or crossings. The signalling appliances and tracks are sometimes collectively re ...

s on the line are (east to west): F Tower, QN Tower, Georgetown Jct, Montrose, Derwood, Cloppers, Buck Lodge, Dickerson, PEPCO, Tuscarora, East Rocks, Point of Rocks, East Brunswick, WB Tower and Weverton.

Engineering features

Metropolitan_Subdivision_CSX_by_Dickerson_spur_and_Monocacy_River_Maryland

The line's bridges cross: * Tuscarora Creek. Originally a

Bollman truss The Bollman Truss Railroad Bridge across the Little Patuxent River at Savage, Maryland, is one of the oldest standing iron railroad bridges in the United States and the sole surviving example of a revolutionary design in the history of American ...

iron Iron () is a chemical element with symbol Fe (from la, ferrum) and atomic number 26. It is a metal that belongs to the first transition series and group 8 of the periodic table. It is, by mass, the most common element on Earth, right in f ...

bridge, replaced with a girder bridge in 1904. *

Monocacy River The Monocacy River () is a free-flowing left tributary to the Potomac River, which empties into the Atlantic Ocean via the Chesapeake Bay. The river is long,U.S. Geological Survey. National Hydrography Dataset high-resolution flowline data ...

. Originally a Bollman truss, replaced with a seven-span girder bridge in 1904. *

Little Monocacy River The Little Monocacy River is a U.S. Geological Survey. National Hydrography Dataset high-resolution flowline dataThe National Map, accessed August 15, 2011 tributary stream of the Potomac River. Despite its name, the stream does not feed into the Mo ...

. Originally a 500-foot

wood Wood is a porous and fibrous structural tissue found in the stems and roots of trees and other woody plants. It is an organic materiala natural composite of cellulose fibers that are strong in tension and embedded in a matrix of lignin th ...

trestle, replaced by a 331-foot stone arch viaduct in 1906. *

Great Seneca Creek Seneca Creek is a U.S. Geological Survey. National Hydrography Dataset high-resolution flowline dataThe National Map accessed August 15, 2011 stream in Montgomery County, Maryland, USA, roughly northwest of Washington, D.C. It drains into t ...

(Waring Viaduct). Originally a wood and iron trestle, replaced with an arch stone viaduct in 1906. *

Little Seneca Creek Little Seneca Creek is an U.S. Geological Survey. National Hydrography Dataset high-resolution flowline dataThe National Map, accessed August 15, 2011 stream in Montgomery County, Maryland, roughly northwest of Washington, D.C. Geography The ...

. Originally a timber bridge, replaced with a

steel Steel is an alloy made up of iron with added carbon to improve its strength and fracture resistance compared to other forms of iron. Many other elements may be present or added. Stainless steels that are corrosion- and oxidation-resistant ty ...

trestle in 1896, and then a

concrete Concrete is a composite material composed of fine and coarse aggregate bonded together with a fluid cement (cement paste) that hardens (cures) over time. Concrete is the second-most-used substance in the world after water, and is the most wi ...

arch in 1928. * Rock Creek. The original bridge consisted of four 100-ft Bollman trusses. In 1893, the main course of Rock Creek was diverted primarily upstream of the bridge. Before the diversion, a loop in the creek caused it to run almost parallel to the bridge. The realignment allowed the tracks to cross Rock Creek at a right angle. The Bollman trusses were replaced by a stone arch bridge from 1893-1896.

References

External links

{{commons category
The Georgetown Branch
- History and photos CSX Transportation lines Rail infrastructure in Washington, D.C. Rail infrastructure in Maryland Baltimore and Ohio Railroad lines