As a newly constructed line, this “streetcar” makes no sense whatsoever – why waste all that transit money replacing a traffic-ridden rushhour-only shuttle bus with a traffic-ridden train? We already have a bus system as well as more than enough people using their own cars. Confused, I explored the area in Google Earth.

I encourage you to zoom in on the satellite feed:

Turns out, there’s a 6 mile long singletrack already built & in place(The Shepherd Industrial Spur) that can deliver people from the Anacostia Metro to the dense employment centers at NRL, Bolling, & Anacostia with a little fixing up, as well as to the new St. Elizabeth’s DHS complex on a 1-mile spur that’s been graveled over (Replacing a Metro infill station likely to cost $100-$200 million). It’s owned but unused by CSX. A few of the grade intersections appear to be paved over, but most are signalized & a few are even bridged. With a few thousand feed of freight track separation in front of Fort Dupont, you could even utilize another 1.5 miles of track to run a transit line all the way up to the Minnesota Avenue station on the Orange Line.

Yes, it would be singletracked, but you can still do a lot with a singletrack, particularly if you double-track a few hundred feet in front of the Anacostia Metro Station, effectively dividing the span into two 4-mile tracks. Thus, two 400-foot long light rail vehicles serving 6 stations each on 4-mile-long segments would be implemented for a few million dollars, with traffic problems limited to isolated base roads & 1 grade crossing each on Suitland Parkway, South Capitol Street, and Howard Road.

The city saw this, and sprang to buy the rights from CSX and begin operation. When CSX revealed that they only had easement rights over some of the land, the District tried to renegotiate the $16M they’d offered, and CSX held out. Meanwhile the people enthusiastic about streetcars (who had been bothered that it wasn’t actually on any walkable streets) grabbed the reins and took the approved, groundbroken project to the nearest suitable right of way – South Capitol Street – a freeway anathema to the concept of “streetcar”. Anywhere else, and the busy 2-4 lane semi-urban streets of Anacostia would have to be widened beyond practicality. The three years since then have seen the project stall, an anachronism which noone wanted to build.

The City Paper describes the situation well.

Don’t look at it as a streetcar, look at it as light rail that extends Metro. This is perhaps a third of the benefit of a new Metro line across Anacostia, at 1% of the price. It won’t automatically revitalize Minnesota Avenue due to the quarter-mile walk, but it will serve it better for residents than buses during peak hours, especially once Poplar Point is built, and it will make the jobs overlooking Potomac in SW quite transit-accessible for nonresidents.