How a VRE extension to Haymarket and Gainesville could bring the closure of a popular Manassas line station

The Broad Run Station is the first stop on the Manassas commuter rail line on weekday mornings and the last each weekday afternoon.

And it could become a thing of the past.

Virginia Railway Express is conducting a study of a proposed 11-mile extension of the system’s Manassas line to Gainesville and Haymarket called the GHX. If service is expanded, trains will travel along what’s known as Norfolk-Southern’s “B line” from Haymarket to Gainesville, to Innovation Park at George Mason University Science and Technology Campus, and then travel the main line through Manassas onto Washington D.C.’s Union Station.

The 2-year GHX study will indicate how much it would cost to expand the state’s only commuter railroad, and identify any impacts to the environment that could be caused by an expansion. Up to two additional tracks could be needed to accommodate the extra passenger trains — up to two an hour during peak periods – as well as the existing freight traffic that currently uses the line.

Extra trains would mean VRE needs more placed to store them. An existing storage yard at the Broad Run / Manassas Airport station in an obvious choice. That yard would need to be expanded, leaving little room left for the rail station.

“We’re up against the airport on one side, and a flood plain on another,” said VRE CEO Doug Allen. The two-lane street Piper Lane leading to the station is often flooded out after rains when Broad Run spills its banks.

The study will examine whether or not to move the station further east along the line, to somewhere near the Prince William Chamber of Commerce building on Capital Court, or further west of the airport. The study could also suggest closing the station altogether, and that would mean those who use the station today would need to drive about three miles north to a new station that would be built at Innovation Park.

The Broad Run station is popular with not only Prince William County and Manassas residents but also those who drive in from neighboring Fauquier County and points west to access the VRE system. VRE would need to negotiate land deals for the three new stations. The commuter railroad would most likely need to buy land in which to build the stations.

Allen said a spur off of the B line into Innovation Park would be necessary to make the station more convenient for riders to access. That would allow riders to walk to nearby destinations like the University, Freedom Aquatics and Fitness, and Hylton Performing Arts centers, as well as the many life sciences labs and offices popping up in the area.

If reverse commuting service from Washington on the Manassas and Fredericksburg lines is implemented, trains could bring students and employees to Innovation Park, increasing the need for walkability.

VRE on November 16 opened up it’s first new station since the original commuter rail system opened in 1992, in Spotsylvania County. It sits on 22 acres of land — most of which is used for riders who park their cars during the day and catch the train to work.

“It’s big,” said Allen, of the Spotsylvania property.

The Gainesville-Haymarket study will determine how much land would be required for the three new proposed stations on the B line. Those stations could be the same land footprint as the Spotsylvania station.