The Sun's recent editorial on the proposed Red Line fails to recognize that if the state had been able to develop a feasible project during the protracted planning process the light rail transit system would already have been on track to meet its target completion date of 2014 ("Don't kill the 'Jobs Line,'" Jan. 4).
Instead, the escalating cost of the redundant downtown tunnel and a series of compromises have left us with a slow, low-capacity line that doesn't connect properly to other transit modes.
The good news is that Gov.-elect Larry Hogan can pick up the pieces of outgoing Gov. Martin O'Malley's shattered Red Line. Most of the project is salvageable, allowing a first phase and rail yard to be built quickly west of and in lieu of the downtown tunnel, and for just a small fraction of the MTA's impossible $3 billion price tag.
Some of the savings can then be devoted to redeveloping the "Highway to Nowhere" along Route 40, the abandoned SSA Metro West complex, the Lexington Market transit hub and other areas that would make the Red line into a true "Jobs Line" instead of empty hype and promises.
Gerald Neily, Baltimore