What is the DMV?
Throughout this whole blog you’ll see me referring to something called the “DMV” which is an acronym that stands for “DC, Maryland, Virginia”. Those unfamiliar might think this includes every part of Maryland and Virginia however it really only includes specific parts of it. The uncontested parts of the DMV consist of Montgomery/Prince George's County in Maryland, the City of Arlington/Fairfax County in Virginia and the entirety of Washington DC. These places directly border DC and have extensive public transport access in and out of the city. Seems simple enough but some people claim that other areas are also a part of it. Contested areas often include the County/City of Baltimore and Frederick/Howard County in Maryland along with Prince William/Loudoun County in Virginia.
The following is the criteria of what I hear makes a place part of the DMV:
Some of the contested areas actually meet at least one of these points to a certain extent. Since late 2022, the Metro has expanded into a small part of Loudoun County (Sterling/Ashburn) which is causing improvements to the public transportation of the area. As of the time I’m writing this, the public transportation is still far from reliable since it primarily focuses on Sterling/Ashburn and even then most of the buses only pass about 2-3 times a day. Despite all this, Loudoun County will definitely improve in this regard in the next couple of years because of all the people from surrounding places coming to work in the area. The potential reopening of White’s Ferry, a route that’s been closed since 2020, would make it significantly easier to go in and out of Montgomery County. (this is a rant for another time). Prince William County is somewhat close to Washington DC, specifically Woodbridge and Manassas, but they lack a metro station + reliable public transport. From what I’ve noticed there’s definitely lots of cultural similarities going on with them and the rest of the DMV. The City of Baltimore has a lot of back and forth with the DMV but they seem to have pretty distinct cultures of their own. Baltimore has their own public transportation but none of it goes directly into DC (Amtrak/Greyhound doesn’t count -_-). It’s pretty out of the way to begin with, on a good day DC/Baltimore are about an hour away from each other. Frederick and Howard county are just far and have nothing going on. I genuinely have nothing to say about them. For the record, I don’t really care if these people claim to be from the DMV even though I have my own reservations about it. At the end of the day, it’s not something worth fighting about.