Metro announced this morning that they are working to redesign the underground stations of its system. They are considering multiple new concepts, and have made a video to highlight a few options they’re considering for Bethesda station. The options include an anti-slip zone at the bottom of the escalators, and replacement of the traditional “Metro Brown” with sleek metal panels. Concrete barriers will be replaced with glass ones in the mezzanine section, and the standalone pylon lights will be replaced with taller winged standards that will include PID displays.
The concepts they’re playing with are still virtual, but it will not stay that way. Look for Bethesda station to get a few of these new concepts over the next few years, with the renovations being completed in 2015. The station will also be getting new escalators during the process, so if this is a regular spot for you, it’s probably going to get delightfully inconvenient (which is not WMATA’s new slogan, even if maybe it should be.) over the next few years.
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Some of this is silly. Glass instead of metal? Visible fingerprints? How about making trains run more regularly and cheaply.
The glass sounds like a bad idea. But some of the other things, especially the new pylons and way-finding signs, sound really smart.
However, Metro’s underlining problem right now are their trains; those need to be their first, second, & third priorities. I realize this is only a concept station, but too often these sorts of things are like self fulfilling prophecies and can easily divert resources from other priorities.