Design

A New Vision for D.C.'s Abandoned Streetcar Tunnels

Plans are once again underway to bring Dupont Circle's tunnels back to life—but will the neighborhood get behind it?
Dupont Underground

Washington, D.C.'s original streetcar system, like that of so many other U.S. cities, was dismantled in the early 1960s, its routes largely replaced by public buses. (It would be another 15 years before the first stage of the city's Metrorail system opened.) While most of the old streetcars operated on tracks above ground, a couple of tunnels were integrated into the system in the 1940s, the largest of which was located directly under one of the city's focal points: Dupont Circle.

One of the first streetcars enters the Dupont Circle tunnel just as construction was wrapping up in 1949.