Last Thursday, I was heading into the heart of downtown to attend the weekly Metro board meeting and was stunned by the number of people on the trains. I let two totally packed trains go by before squeezing my way onto a third. I guess the cherry blossoms account for some of this, but it was at 8:30 in the morning and not at a time when most tourists and residents are going to the Tidal Basin.
During the weekend, it was brought to my attention by my good friend Transit Ben that Friday was the third-busiest day of all time on Metro with more than 808,000 trips. That put it ahead of the Million Man March and only behind the Reagan State Funeral and the first Clinton inauguration.
Those 808,000-plus trips represented an increase of more than 10 percent over the passenger load on the same day last year. I can’t wait until more of those eight-car trains get put into service.
What’s the best way to improve Rockville Pike?
Carl writes: “Your idea to limit left turns and add signalized U turns on Rockville Pike may have merit. But taking the space between parking lots and the road to make service roads would be a big mistake. That space is where the sidewalks are. To improve Rockville Pike, we need to expand those sidewalk areas to allow bikers and pedestrians to safely pass each other and put in a larger landscape area between the sidewalk and the road both to provide greater pedestrian safety and to have a place for plowed snow to pile up other than the sidewalks.
“The plans to ‘improve’ the 28/Viers Mill intersection are poorly conceived. Why spend $30 million to $70 million to move the traffic one block further to back up again at Rockville Pike? It’s better to recognize that adding more pavement in the last few years before global oil production peaks make little sense. It’s better to spend that money to provide improved transit. Rockville Metro doesn’t have a free shuttle service to nearby offices like is available in Silver Spring. A free shuttle with a stop at the new library would be a nice complement to the free parking that has been promised.”
This isn’t simply about adding more pavement but about moving traffic volumes onto more efficient areas to reduce congestion and to save the number of cars and trucks idling and wasting gas. The sidewalks along Rockville Pike in this area are very underutilized in large part because of the design of the development, which sets the buildings far back from the main road and almost demands that people drive there. A sidewalk could still be a part of the plan but would have to be set back from the road as well. That does create challenges for things like bus stops but, like they have in Tysons, these can be accommodated as well.
Questions, comments,
random musings? Write to [email protected].
