M-1 Rail Line

QLine
Test train at Campus Martius station in May 2017
Overview
Type	Streetcar
Locale	Detroit, Michigan
Termini	Grand Boulevard Congress Street
Stations	20 stops (12 locations)
Daily ridership	5,400 (forecast)
Website	qlinedetroit.com
Operation
Opened	May 12, 2017 (May 12, 2017)
Operator(s)	M-1 Rail
Rolling stock	6 Brookville Liberty Modern Streetcars
Technical
Line length	3.3 mi (5.3 km)
Track gauge	4 ft 8 1⁄2 in (1,435 mm) standard gauge
Electrification	overhead catenary, lithium-ion battery
Operating speed	30 mph (48 km/h)
Route map Amtrak to Pontiac Grand Boulevard Baltimore Street Amtrak to Chicago Amsterdam Street I-94 (Edsel Ford Freeway) Ferry Street Warren Avenue Canfield Street Martin Luther King Boulevard/ Mack Avenue Sproat Street/Adelaide Street I-75 (Fisher Freeway) Montcalm Street Detroit People Mover Grand Circus Park Campus Martius Congress Street This diagram:

The QLine (stylized as QLINE), originally known as M-1 Rail by its developers and the Woodward Avenue Streetcar by the Michigan Department of Transportation (MDOT), is a streetcar system that runs along M-1 (Woodward Avenue) in Detroit, Michigan, and opened in 2017. Quicken Loans bought the naming rights to the line, and announced the name in March 2016. In December 2011, city and state leaders announced a plan to offer bus rapid transit service for the city and metropolitan area instead of light rail as had previously been proposed. Soon afterwards, M-1 Rail, a consortium of private and public businesses and institutions in the region, announced the plan for a 3.3-mile-long (5.3 km) streetcar line along part of the same route as the cancelled light rail plan, connecting the downtown Detroit People Mover to the railway station in New Center which serves Amtrak and the proposed SEMCOG commuter rail system. The line opened on May 12, 2017.

Detroit's first streetcar service began in 1863 with horsecars. Electrification of the streetcar system followed, starting in 1886. Detroit's streetcar lines eventually saw their operations consolidated under the privately owned Detroit United Railway. Municipal takeover and control of the streetcar network by Detroit's Department of Street Railways followed in 1922. But Detroit Mayor Hazen S. Pingree had led the charge years before to have the city take over operations. Since this gave the companies reason to believe their rail lines would be taken over, they were discouraged from maintaining the lines and meant that Detroiters had "inherited a giant money pit." when the city did eventually vote to buy them. This and the Department of Street Railways' introduction of buses (starting in 1925) ultimately led to the demise of the original streetcar system in 1956.