Zachary Schrag, Professor, History and Art History, College of Humanities and Social Sciences (CHSS), received funding for the project: “Rail Against Sprawl: A History of the Dulles Corridor Metrorail Project.”
Schrag said, “I am writing the history of the Dulles Corridor Metrorail Project, among the nation’s most ambitious efforts to reshape daily transportation choices. After decades of planning and construction, the project was completed in 2022, extending the Washington Metro rail transit system for twenty-three miles from Arlington, Virginia, through Tysons Corner and Washington Dulles International Airport into fast-growing Loudoun County.”
He said, further, that although it operates as part of Metro’s new Silver Line, the project should be understood not merely as an extension of Metro, but rather as a bold undertaking in its own right, one that seeks to give airport passengers, airport employees, commuters, residents, and shoppers an alternative to constant driving, and to cluster development into transit-accessible nodes instead of the suburban sprawl that characterizes so much of Northern Virginia and the United States.
Schrag received $74,999 from the National Endowment for the Humanities for this project. Funding began in July 2024 and will end in late June 2025.
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