2025 Texas & Southeast Best Projects
Award of Merit, Airport/Transit: Dart Silver Line Regional Rail

Dart Silver Line Regional Rail
Grapevine, Coppell, Dallas, Carrollton, Addison, Richardson and Plano, Texas
Award of Merit
Submitted by: WSP
Owner Dallas Area Rapid Transit/WSP/Ardurra
Lead Design Firm Jacobs
General Contractor Archer Western Herzog
The latest addition to Dallas Area Rapid Transit’s service is a 26-mile regional rail line that traverses seven cities and three counties with a final connection at Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport.
The line is equipped with a fleet of new EPA Tier 4 diesel-electric multiple unit rail vehicles that meet EPA compliance standards and will help reduce emissions. These low-maintenance railcars don’t use an overhead catenary and are equipped with noise-dampening features for quiet traversal near neighborhoods.
The corridor includes 10 stations and 40 major structures. During design, the team integrated varied superstructure types such as thru-girders and prestressed girders, along with substructure types tailored to site-specific constraints. In locations with limited vertical clearance, thru-girder bridges allowed for safe travel without affecting surrounding infrastructure. The team utilized prefabricated pedestrian bridges and distinctive architectural elements throughout the line and added a 5.6-mile hike-and-bike trail.
Getting the project from concept to completion required long-term collaboration, political coordination and sustained community engagement over several years.
Community engagement played a central role for the project team throughout the process, and the choice of design elements such as enhanced noise walls, quiet zones, station architecture and pedestrian connectivity were directly influenced by this feedback process.


