A kickoff for Orange Line rail route

I received an invitation today to attend something called a Rail Stacking, which, I am told, is to railroads what ribbon cuttings are to storefronts. According to the invitation, the occasion is to "celebrate the start of the DFW Orange Line. The DFW Orange Line marks a major accomplishment for regional rail to connect downtown Dallas with the Dallas Fort Worth International Airport."

In Journalism school it was hammered into me that "A good journalist never assumes anything," but, what the hell, I'm going to make a couple of assumptions here. The first is that this occasion is to mark the beginning of construction, not the beginning of operations. If this isn't true, then the Orange Line is one of the great stealth projects in rail history. The second assumption I'm going to make is that, since the rail line has a color as its designation, like all the DART rail lines, this has something to do with DART, although the invitation never uses the acronym "DART" except in very small letters under a picture that claims said picture is "Courtesy of DART."

Anyway, the Rail Stacking is supposed to take place at 1 p.m., Monday, April 13, at 3215 Spur 482 (see the map above), near the soon-to-be-demolished Texas Stadium. U.S. Rep. Pete Sessions, R-Texas, will be a featured speaker.

The Orange Line is going to be special. It will mean that, if (1) I'm still alive in four-plus years and (2) I can still afford an occasional journey by air, I will be able to travel from my home to DFW by rail. The line is supposed to be running between Dallas and Las Colinas by December 2011 and to terminals A and B by December 2013. Now that's something to celebrate.