Blue Line (Washington Metro)

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Lines of the Washington Metro
	Red Line
	Orange Line
	Blue Line
	Yellow Line
	Green Line
	Silver Line (Planned)

The Blue Line of the Washington Metro consists of 27 subway stations from Franconia-Springfield to Largo Town Center. It has stations in Fairfax County, Alexandria and Arlington, Virginia, the District of Columbia, and Prince George's County, Maryland. Most of the line's stations are shared with the Orange Line, and another portion is also shared by the Yellow Line; only eight stations are exclusive to the Blue Line.

1 History
2 List of stations, west to east
3 See also
4 External links

[edit] History

Service on the Blue Line began on July 1, 1977 on eighteen stations between National Airport in Arlington and Stadium-Armory in Washington, the first link of the Metro to Virginia. The line was extended by three stations to Addison Road on November 22, 1980. It started service south of National Airport on June 15, 1991 when Van Dorn Street was opened. The original plan for the line was completed when this link was extended to Franconia-Springfield on June 29, 1997. Two new stations in Maryland, Morgan Boulevard and Largo Town Center, opened on December 18, 2004. These two stations are the first beyond the original plan.

The Blue Line was originally planned to follow a slightly different route than it now follows. The original plan would have sent Blue Line trains to Huntington, with Yellow Line trains serving Franconia-Springfield. This was changed due to a shortage of rail cars at the time of the completion of the line to Huntington. As less rail cars were required to operate Yellow Line service than it would be to run Blue Line service out to Huntington, due to the Yellow Line's shorter route, the line designations were switched. Currently, the Blue Line only operates to Huntington on July 4, as part of Metro's special service pattern on that day.