The county’s latest design for a revamped Old Georgetown Road near Rockville Pike is too wide and doesn’t reflect the pedestrian-friendly nature outlined in the 2010 White Flint Sector Plan, according to a local activist.
The 70 percent road design, unveiled last week by the county’s Department of Transportation, also doesn’t include bike lanes in each direction that were recommended in the Sector Plan — the planning document approved by the County Council that serves as the blueprint for redevelopment happening and planned in the area around the White Flint Metro station.
Lindsay Hoffman, executive director of the Friends of White Flint group, claimed MCDOT is sabotaging the new road network planned for west of Rockville Pike in a lengthy critique published Tuesday on the group’s website.
The Friends of White Flint, a nonprofit made up of residents, developers and business owners, says its mission is to see the White Flint Sector Plan carried out as prescribed. The group joined the Coalition for Smarter Growth on Wednesday in a call for residents to email County Executive Isiah Leggett’s office and urge MCDOT to reconsider its Old Georgetown Road design.
The issue of Old Georgetown Road has been bubbling since June 2013, when MCDOT officials first presented a 35 percent design of the road between Executive Boulevard and Rockville Pike that was wider and had a higher speed limit than many had hoped for.
A week later, Councilmember Roger Berliner sent a letter to MCDOT echoing many of those same concerns.
The design unveiled last week by MCDOT includes keeping the existing three thru lanes and a turn lane for much of the length of Old Georgetown Road between Grand Park Avenue (the new road at the entrance of the Pike & Rose project) and Towne Road (what is now known as Hoya Street).
Hoffman wrote that essentially means an eight-lane road when the Sector Plan recommended four:
In defense of their design, MCDOT argues that this is a four-lane road. According to them, the design technically contains only two travel lanes in each direction; the additional lanes, which extend nearly the entire length of the roadway, are “merely turning lanes.”
This obfuscation may hold water for traffic engineers, but for anyone unlucky enough to bike or walk along the road, that distinction provides little comfort. Under the MCDOT proposal, a pedestrian must traverse eight lanes of traffic to get across Old Georgetown Road. For cyclists, the lack of dedicated lanes means they must take their chances staying safe among four lanes of traffic.
In reality, the effect of this design will be even more wide-reaching. By prioritizing driving over everything else, MCDOT will fulfill its own skewed vision for mobility in the county: fewer people will walk, bike or take transit. Even if we want to, we just won’t feel safe. Instead, we’ll choose to drive for every single trip, adding to congestion and undermining the entire premise of the White Flint Sector Plan redevelopment.
Dee Metz, the county’s White Flint coordinator, said the design for Old Georgetown Road is complicated by the fact that it’s a State Highway route. She said the State Highway Administration made it clear two years ago to Federal Realty, developer of the Pike & Rose project on the north side of the road, that the four-lane redesign wouldn’t come right away.
“The state really controls any decisions on Old Georgetown Road, and they made it clear back when The Preliminary Plan for Pike & Rose was approved in 2012, through a condition of approval, that they required six lanes to remain on Old Georgetown Road until Rockville Pike was reconstructed,” Metz wrote in an email.
Hoffman wrote that the idea of redesigning Old Georgetown Road twice, “once now to maximize auto traffic, and again, sometime in the future, to incorporate the elements promised in the Sector Plan,” was “an inefficient use of our tax dollars.”
Federal Realty has also been lobbying county and state officials to reconsider the design. A wider shared-use path on Old Georgetown Road could provide the developer the opportunity to have outdoor cafe-style seating at its properties.
The issue is part of a broader conflict going on in the redevelopment of White Flint.
Many who took part in the Sector Plan process want to shrink lane widths, build curb extensions at intersections and offer off-peak hour street parking to create the urban, pedestrian feel that has become the norm in places such as downtown Bethesda. But county and state traffic officials say they must balance that desire with the existing need to move vehicles and avoid congestion.
Rockville Pike remains a six-lane road with a 40 mph speed limit that at times operates more like a highway. Some in the Friends of White Flint group feel it’s creating a dangerous mix for pedestrians just as the first of the new, transit- oriented development projects sprout.
On Aug. 6, 24-year-old Matthew Papirmeister was struck by a car while crossing the southbound lanes of Rockville Pike at Executive Boulevard. The intersection is at the North Bethesda Market property that includes apartments, Montgomery County’s tallest building, upscale restaurants and a Whole Foods store. Papirmeister died in the hospital a few days later.
“Instead of the bicycle and pedestrian friendly road the community was promised, MCDOT’s design for Old Georgetown Road calls for more high-speed car lanes while eliminating the bike lanes, walking and cycling path, and recreation loop required by the Sector Plan,” read the Coalition for Smarter Growth’s action alert. “Not only does this design make White Flint even less safe, it undermines the years of work by stakeholders to develop a plan for the future of their community.”
Image via Friends of White Flint
