Franconia, Van Dorn Street Metro Stations Closing For 2 Weeks

SPRINGFIELD, VA — The Franconia-Springfield and Van Dorn Street Metro stations will be closed for two weeks as part of work to upgrade its signal system.

The closure will take place from Saturday, Dec. 19 to Sunday, Jan. 3. That's in addition to weekend closures that started on Nov. 27 and will end on March 14.

Metro crews are working to modernize the signal system in the Alexandria Rail Yard, aiming to improve safety, reliability and on-time performance. Metro said in a news release the full two-week closure will allow crews to conduct around-the-clock work. If the work were done with single tracking, the estimated completion time would be twice as long with wait times up to 36 minutes between trains.

Scheduling the work during the holidays is aimed at reducing the number of impacted riders. Ridership at both stations is down about 90 percent due to the COVID-19 pandemic and usually drops during the holidays.

During the station closures, Blue Line service will operate between Huntington and Largo Town Center. Riders may use Huntington station as an alternative, and parking is available.

Free and express shuttle buses will operate on several routes. There will be a shuttle bus serving FRanconia-Springfield, Van Dorn Street and Eisenhower Avenue, a shuttle serving Franconia-Springfield and Pentagon (except Christmas and New Year's Day) and Van Dorn Street and Pentagon rush hour service from 5 a.m. to 8:30 a.m. and 3 p.m. to 6:30 p.m. (except Christmas and New Year's Day). Riders should plan for additional travel time for shuttle buses.