Streetcars and interurbans operated in the Maryland suburbs of Washington, D.C., between 1890 and 1962.
Lines in Maryland were established as separate legal entities, most with grand plans in mind, but none succeeded financially. Eventually they were all owned or leased by DC Transit (see Streetcars in Washington, D.C.). Unlike the Virginia lines, the combined Washington and Maryland lines were scheduled as a single system. A combination of the rise of the automobile, various economic downturns and bustitution eventually spelled the end of streetcars in southern Maryland.
Companies
Rock Creek Railway
One of the first electric streetcar companies in Washington, D.C., the Rock Creek Railway was incorporated in 1888 and started operations in 1890. After expansion, the line ran from the Cardoza/Shaw neighborhood of D.C. to Chevy Chase Lake, Maryland. On September 21, 1895, the company purchased the Washington and Georgetown Railroad Company and the two formed the Capital Traction Company.
Remnants of the Line include: The Chevy Chase Lake waiting station that existed at the northern end of the line was disassembled in 1980 and moved to Hyattstown, Maryland.
Tennallytown and Rockville Railroad
A trio of streetcar companies provided service from Georgetown north and ultimately to Rockville, Maryland. The first one was the Georgetown and Tennallytown Railway, chartered on August 22, 1888, and just the third D.C. streetcar company to incorporate. It began operations in 1890 on a route that ran up from M Street NW up 32nd Street NW and then onto the Georgetown and Rockville Road (now Wisconsin Avenue NW) to the extant village of Tenleytown. That same year, the Tennallytown and Rockville Railway received its charter and began building tracks from the G&T's northern terminus to today's D.C. neighborhood of Friendship Heights and the Maryland state line. Finally, the Washington and Rockville Electric Railway was incorporated in 1897 to extend the tracks into Maryland line and onward to Bethesda and Rockville. Controlling interest in the companies was obtained first by the Washington Traction and Electric Company, then in 1902 by the Washington Railway and Electric Company. Streetcar service was replaced with buses in 1935.
Stations of the T&R and W&R included: Tennallytown (Tenleytown) Somerset Bethesda Alta Vista Bethesda Park Montrose Halpine Fairgrounds Rockville
Remnants of the line include: Wisconsin Avenue and Old Georgetown Road still exist The Bethesda Trolley Trail, a rail trail that runs along the old right-of-way Woodglen Drive in Rockville
Glen Echo Railroad
Opened on June 10, 1891, the Glen Echo Railroad initially ran about 2.5 miles from Wisconsin Avenue due west to Conduit Road (today's Macarthur Boulevard). The line connected Tennallytown and Rockville Railroad's terminal at Willard Avenue near Friendship Heights to a masonry car barn and powerhouse near the intersection of Walhonding Road.
In 1895, a proposed sale of the railroad, desired by its creditors, was stopped by injunction of its owners. In 1896, the company renamed itself the Washington and Glen Echo Railroad and extended its line from its western terminus northwest through Glen Echo proper to Cabin John. Shortly thereafter, the railroad began to extend its line east of Wisconsin Avenue, thanks to the Chevy Chase Land Company, which granted the railroad permission to cross its land and extend the line about two-thirds of a mile northeastward to Chevy Chase Circle, where it connected with the Capital Traction Company's Rock Creek Railway line. After the connection to the Circle was made, a new, more direct line would be laid from the circle through the town of Somerset to the Conduit-Walhonding car barn, resulting in a new crossing of the Tennallytown and Rockville line about a quarter-mile north of the Wisconsin-Willard terminal. This new alignment may have been planned to benefit the line's owners, "Philadelphia capitalists" who "own considerable real estate at Somerset Heights".
The railroad was abandoned in 1902, but the section from Walhonding Road to Cabin John was incorporated into the Washington and Great Falls Electric Railway.
The car barn was not totally demolished until after 1940. Railroad tracks and the trestle site remain visible in the Willard Avenue Neighborhood Park in Bethesda, Maryland.