Red painted bus-only lanes run along University Boulevard in Wheaton.
The lanes are along a two-mile corridor between Amherst and Dennis avenues. County leaders commemorated the new lanes Friday morning at Wheaton Forest Local Park, which is next to the lanes.
They were put into use in February, according to the county. Bicyclists can also use the lanes.
“Making sure that we are actually uplifting our low-income communities and making sure that they can get to places fast, is something that we should embrace,” said Councilmember Natali Fani-González, county councilmember representing Wheaton.
Councilmember Evan Glass, chair of the county council’s Transportation and Environment committee, said the project is about making sure transit-dependent residents can safely get around the community — “To go to school, to go to work, to run daily errands, and to do so in a safe, reliable and affordable way.”
The lanes are part of the county’s Bus Priority Project which will add other bus lanes in the county. The county’s transportation department will monitor the bus lanes over the next 12 months as a pilot program.
The results will be released in Dec. 2025 to assess if the bus lanes are beneficial. They are also painted around the Germantown Transit Center — that project was completed in 2021.
Bus-only lane on University Blvd in Wheaton. @mymcmedia pic.twitter.com/WQ6wiCwsQ8
— Maryam Shahzad (@maryam_mcm) March 8, 2024
