Posts about Montgomery

I've listed the downcounty races first, followed by the other districts.

District 16 (Glen Echo, Bethesda, Rockville Pike) has the western end of the Purple Line, significant bus ridership, a number of Metro stations and the county's most walkable downtown.

Senator Brian Frosh has been a leader on transportation issues, including circulating the letter supporting a transit alternative to widening I-270.

ACT is displeased with delegate Bill Frick's lack of absolute firmness on the Purple Line, and he specifically said he supports the 270 widening. However, he did sign the Purple Line Now pledge, and took the time to send a letter to the National Park Service after reading about a Rock Creek Park issue here on Greater Greater Washington. We feel he deserves another term.

Kyle Lierman and Scott Goldberg are among the many challengers vying for the one open seat or one of the incumbents'. Mr. Lierman's strength mostly comes from family political connections, but he wants to champion the Purple Line, get more funding to Metro, and raise the gas tax.

Mr. Goldberg, whom Cavan interviewed, also strongly supports the Purple Line, definitely understands induced demand, and wants the state to do better to minimize car-dependent sprawl. Either would make an excellent representative for the area.

District 18 (Chevy Chase, Kensington, Wheaton) contains the Town of Chevy Chase and Columbia Country Club, Ground Zero for the Purple Line battle. The political race for Delegate has not disappointed, boiling down largely to a referendum on the Purple Line.

Incumbent Anna Sol Gutierrez and challengers Vanessa Atterbeary and Dana Beyer are running in support of the light rail Purple Line along the alignment selected by the county and state. A strong vote for them, like for Berliner in Council District 2, would send a clear message that voters want to put this vital regional project ahead of local neighborhood obstruction.

Cavan discussed the Purple Line, Smart Growth in Wheaton, budget processes, and more with Ms. Gutierrez, Ms. Beyer and Ms. Atterbeary earlier this summer.

The other two incumbents are Al Carr and Jeff Waldstreicher. Mr. Carr has been a friend to the environment, cycling and transit with the exception of his Purple Line stance. He introduced bills for the bag fee and reforming "accident" language. While we hate to focus exclusively on single issues (and haven't in other races, like Mr. Frick in District 16), the Purple Line is the key place the state government will influence the future of this area in the immediate term, and having a supportive local delegation is important.

Senator Rich Madeleno has not been good on the Purple Line, but has been good on transit funding from the state in general, and is likely to be a key player in advocacy for transportation funding. He's also unopposed.

The controversy over the Purple Line in District 18 is nowhere to be found in District 20 (Silver Spring, Takoma Park, White Oak), where the sitting delegation absolutely supports the Purple Line and is otherwise terrific on practically every single issue.

Senator Jamie Raskin and Delegates Sheila Hixson, Tom Hucker and Heather Mizeur deserve a speedy return to Annapolis. Among many other things, Mr. Raskin was the Senate introducer of the bag fee and Ms. Hixson organized the I-270 transit alternative letter.

District 14 (Burtonsville, Brookeville, Damascus) is one of the more rural districts in the county, with no Metro stations. However, the Intercounty Connector will run through the district's southeastern portion.

Delegate Karen Montgomery deserves to win in her challenge against incumbent Senator Rona Kramer. Ms. Kramer supported the ICC, while Ms. Montgomery opposed it. Ms. Kramer's family includes developers who build sprawling strip malls, and on policy her actions align with theirs. Outside of GGW issues, Ms. Kramer has also taken some very unusual stands for her party, like opposing a progressive income tax.

For Delegate, we support incumbent Anne Kaiser and open-seat candidates Eric Luedke and Craig Zucker. Luedke is even a blogger, having written periodically for Maryland Politics Watch.

District 15 (Poolesville, Barnesville, Clarksburg) is the other rural district. There are no Metro stations and a relatively low proportion of transit use, though MARC's Brunswick line has many stations in this district.

Senator Rob Garagiola and Delegates Kathleen Dumais and Brian Feldman have been reliable supporters of transit funding including Metro and MARC, though in many cases also road construction as well. Mr. Garagiola authored the bill creating a commission to find a new source of transportation funding which Maryland desperately needs.

Aruna Miller and Lara Wibeto are the leading candidates for the third open seat. Ms. Miller is a transportation engineer for Montgomery County DOT, and some who've tangled with them on road design issues have some complaints about working with her. Otherwise, there does not seem to be a strong difference in their answers on the ACT questionnaire.

District 17 (Garrett Park, Rockville, Gaithersburg) has a high-profile contest between incumbent Senator Jennie Forehand and challenger Cheryl Kagan. Advocates on most issues, including on transit and smart growth, have been hard pressed to find any substantive difference between the two. Forehand spoke up strongly for highway widening during the 270 battle, but Kagan isn't really any better.

The delegate seats are all uncontested. James Gilchrist deserves special kudos for periodically taking the bus from Rockville to Annapolis to attend legislative sessions. Kumar Barve was one of two delegates not to sign the "Fair Share for Metro" letter, and signed the pro-highway 270 letter but not the pro-transit alternative.

District 19 (Glenmont, Aspen Hill, some of Olney) is a fairly static part of the County's middle, almost entirely built out with single family suburban homes (including my in-laws') and not changing very much very quickly for better or worse, except for the ICC running through the middle.

Delegate Roger Manno is trying to take the Senate seat from Mike Lennett. On transportation, both have been good, but Mr. Manno does more legwork to make things happen. Advocates say when they visit Annapolis, Lennett might be on their side, but Mr. Manno greets them and asks how he can help. Mr. Manno was the one to circulate the Metro funding letter on the floor. On that basis, Mr. Manno deserves a vote.

Among the delegates, incumbent Ben Kramer is similar to his sister Rona Kramer, including being very pro-road. Advoactes who've talked with the various candidates had good impressions of Sam Arora and Jay Hutchins on style and substance. Mr. Hutchins had excellent answers on the ACT questionnaire, and we like Mr. Arora's issues page. Disclosure: Mr. Arora and I have mutual friends.

District 39 (Montgomery Village, North Potomac, Darnestown) is the suburban area around the City of Gaithersburg, shaped as it is because state law requires district boundaries to respect incorporated city boundaries. It includes the Great Seneca Science Corridor (formerly Gaithersburg West), but the state legislature had little involvement with this issue. If built, the Corridor Cities Transitway will travel through a significant part of this district's western half.

Saqib Ali is trying to unseat incumbent Seantor Nancy King. Most of the differences are stylistic, especially Mr. Ali's much younger age and perceived greater vigor. But advocates who work with the legislature also say Mr. Ali does more grandstanding than actual legislating, and his bills don't advance because he doesn't work them hard enough. His vigor could be more Twitter-based than actual achievement-oriented.

However, Mr. Ali was willing to take a clear stand against widening I-270. He actually publicly renounced the pro-widening letter he himself signed, saying he hadn't seen the 270 part, which was below the pro-Corridor Cities Transitway section of the letter. Maybe it would have been better if he'd read the letter first, but we applaud this action.

Incumbents Charles Barkley and Kirill Reznik have reliably supported transit issues including Metro funding, the Purple Line, and the CCT, including transit alternatives over widening I-270. They deserve reelection. The most viable candidates vying to succeed Mr. Ali are Shane Robinson and Bob Hydorn, whose positions on these issues differ little.

Marc Elrich has been a strong proponent of a Bus Rapid Transit network, pushing the idea tirelessly and making it a signature issue. However, he's also the strongest defender of traffic-based tests that in effect hinder walkable development.

Nancy Floreen pushed through the White Flint plan, one of Montgomery's biggest opportunities for meaningful transit-oriented development, and opposes the traffic-based tests that Elrich likes. On the other hand, she also opposes most rules that would limit development in rural areas far from transit. She generally advocates building in the county and is less discerning about what or where.

George Leventhal has been a leader in the fight for the Purple Line, and for transit in general in the county. Yet he also strongly supported widening I-270, and basically favors any transportation project of any kind in any location. Duchy Trachtenberg has been good on the environment and transit issues as well and not a road booster, but hasn't shown as much leadership on growth and transportation issues generally.

I'd recommend Montgomery residents (like my in-laws) vote for Mr. Riemer and decide among the other candidates based on the other issues, like schools, budgets, labor relations and many more. If you're not sure of some of the candidates, it's also fine to vote for only two or three. Leaving a blank or two on the ballot makes the votes you do cast count even more, as the top four total vote-getters win the seats.

Two district seats are also contested, which happen to be the two that had Montgomery's greatest development debates in the last few years. District 1 includes Chevy Chase, Bethesda and Potomac, and has significant numbers of residents who oppose the Purple Line and/or White Flint. Roger Berliner, the incumbent, has championed both projects a good future for his area despite the short-term political risk. Meanwhile, his challenger, Ilaya Hopkins, has chosen to throw her lot in with the antis. Mr. Berliner should be reelected to prove that anti sentiment doesn't drive Montgomery politics.

In District 2, the suburban and rural northern part of the County, former Planning Board Chair Royce Hanson is the best choice for the open seat. He's been a strong proponent of Smart Growth on the Planning Board, and was largely responsible for the Agricultural Reserve, the large belt of (mostly) protected land at the County's edge, much of which is in that district. His support for the sprawl development at Gaithersburg West was more of a disappointment, but his multi-decade track record warrants your vote.

The other district members, Phil Andrews, Nancy Navarro, and Valerie Ervin, do not have primary challengers.

There will be 3 shuttle bus service patterns:

• Green Shuttle: The Green Shuttle will travel from Georgia Avenue/Petworth station on the Green and Yellow Lines to Silver Spring, Forest Glen, Wheaton, and Glenmont. It will not stop at Takoma station.
• Red Shuttle: The Red Shuttle will run from Fort Totten station on the Green, Yellow, and Red Lines to Takoma, Silver Spring, Forest Glen, Wheaton, and Glenmont.
• Yellow Shuttle: The Yellow Shuttle will travel from Fort Totten station to Takoma and Silver Spring. It will not serve Forest Glen, Wheaton, or Glenmont stations.

In addition, regular Metrobus service will connect passengers to other stations. Riders should look into routes C4, C8, J2, Q1, Q2, Q4, Q5, Q6, and Ride-On routes 10, 34, and 38. These routes will connect passengers to the other side of the Red Line (along Rockville Pike). Some lines also connect to the northern section of the Green Line in Prince George's County.

Metro says this trackwork project is one of the largest ever conducted by the agency. It includes several components, including the replacement of two switches at Silver Spring as recommended by the National Transportation Safety Board. Other work includes replacement of cross ties, cables, track fasteners, insulators, and fire pipe.

You can always stay on top of scheduled service disruptions using our disruption calendar.

Future plans:

On indefinite hold: Prince Georges County Connector from 19th Ave to Chillum Road.

TBD:

• Construction of the section from Michigan Avenue to Fort Totten.
  
• Design and construction of the 1st St, NE to DC-MD line section.
  
• Design and construction of the PG County Connector from South Dakota Avenue to the DC/MD line.
  
• Ramp built from 1st St NE to trail above L Street. This is dependent on construction beginning on a building to replace the parking lot at the NE corner of 1st and L.

Crossposted at The Washcycle.

It is clear that the enclosed walkway was erected with the rush hour commuter in mind. The walkway makes perfect sense for commuters walking from the parking garage to the Metro. It's light out and there are plenty of people around. My friend noted that at night she couldn't much see around the curve in the sidewalk. It was completely impossible to see around the corner into the parking garage.

It is disappointing that the walkway couldn't have been designed with safety and comfort in mind. I don't think that the enclosed walkway was built to feel unsafe at night on purpose. I think that the concept that a young woman would walk there after dark was just never taken into consideration.

Lighting, mirrors, and perhaps periodic openings for egress are all necessary attributes for a workable temporary walkway. These considerations will be even more important if this walkway is still there in the late fall, when the sun sets before the commute has ended.

Montgomery County can do better than this. The county should plan for pedestrian safety after residents leave those destinations and walk home from the Metro. They should require that if a sidewalk is obstructed due to construction, that a safe alternate route be provided. And that detour should include lighting and other safety features if necessary.

Education
Delegate Sol Gutierrez emphasized that she has a constructive working relationship with the Montgomery County Education Association (MCEA) that dates back to her time serving on the Board of Education in the early 1990's. Ana and her three sons all received a quality public education in Montgomery County. She first ran for the school board because she saw that the county was experiencing demographic changes.

When she returned to the county in the early 1980's after living five years in South America, she was dismayed because it appeared that two different school systems were emerging, based on changing demographics. She looked at the available data and noticed that an achievement gap was developing in parts of the county. When the MCEA was informed of the data, they began collaborating together to implement an educational vision.

Ana recalled that the disposition of the Board of Education during her first term and her second term were very different. The Board during her second term "was very anti-union." Ana worked to focus the anti-union sentiments on improving the processes related to teacher development and evaluation. She said, "If we wanted to improve education, we had to work with the teachers.

The MCEA was a good partner, very collaborative and very progressive." They designed a process where teachers would be given ongoing support and training. If a teacher was judged to need performance improvement, they would be given professional development along with a defined timeline for improvement and standardized expectations. While working with the MCEA, she noted "in many ways, they were more forward thinking than the board."

Delegate Sol Gutierrez's education accomplishments at the state level have included the passage of legislation that more accurately defines the graduation rate, years before the federal government did. Her future education initiatives include extending the mandatory attendance age as a means to reduce the drop-out rates among minority students. Such an extension would include provisions for a system of interventions and enrichment classes to support the higher attendance age. She also favors legislation that would track, report, and intervene with primary school students with low attendance. Poor attendance in elementary school is often a precursor of low academic achievement and with dropping out in high school.

Economy
Because Delegate Sol Gutierrez serves on the House Appropriations Committee, she is acutely aware of the critical economic circumstances that the state and country are currently in. One of the country's ongoing economic problems that is holding back recovery is that banks are refusing to lend to small businesses. The large national banks (the Too-Big-to-Fails) all have large non-performing loans on their balance sheets. Therefore, they are reluctant to lend to any commercial entities except the biggest of big business. However, a few small banks took the kind of risks that the Too-Big-to-Fails took. They simply aren't big enough to cover the gap that the anemic national banks left. Ana sees potential for Maryland to create a special fund to incentivize the solvent, more agile, in-state community banks to increase small business lending.

Because of the ongoing Great Recession, Ana is also pushing for major revisions to established economic projection methodologies. I agree completely. Many economic systems behave differently when an economy is in a liquidity trap. Under normal economic circumstances, if the Federal Reserve maintained (effectively) zero percent interest rates for two years, we would experience very high inflation. The fact that this hasn't happened further bolsters the need to revise inflation and budgetary projection methodologies to incorporate current conditions, along with irregular business growth and investment behaviors.

Purple Line
When I asked Ana how she came to be a champion of the Purple Line, she replied, "The Purple Line embodies what I understand to be social justice." Just like the Metro, it will provide quality transit for all, regardless of socio-economic status. "I understand what it's like for a single parent to have to get up at 5am to catch a bus, then catch another bus to get to work on time… while a child has to wait for a school bus alone." She continued, "We have a two-tiered transportation system right now. The Purple Line will be a major step in creating a high-quality transportation system for all."

Ana also recognizes that the Purple Line will be among the most efficient and competitive light rail project in the United States. When it comes to cost-per-rider metrics, the project scores very well, mainly due to high expected ridership.

She also emphasizes the environmental benefits of smart growth, such as focusing new growth around transit stations inside the beltway rather than bulldozing thousands of acres of old growth forest to create new car-dependent exurban subdivisions.

Because of the placement of the bus stop located on the south side of Marinelli across from the Metro entrance, there is a desire line across the street. The wall makes pedestrians go the long way around, and is typical of the conventional mid-20th century transportation orthodoxy which asserted that cars and pedestrians should be kept separate.

Additionally, the wall creates hazards for motorists. While I was taking photos, I saw two motorists turn left from southbound Rockville Pike (MD 355) into the oncoming lanes on Marinelli Road. A friend of mine who lives in one of the apartment buildings adjacent to the Metro said to me that she did the same thing the first time she turned left onto Marinelli. This wall violates the concept of driver expectancy. Drivers often drive based on what they expect, not necessarily according to actual conditions. To many drivers, a wall implies the side of the road rather than a median.

The wall also partially obstructs drivers' view of pedestrians in and around the crosswalk. It is especially hard for drivers to see road hazards, shorter pedestrians, children, and wheelchair users.

A more progressive approach would be to relocate the bus stop directly across the street from the Metro entrance. The stop line for cars approaching the Rockville Pike intersection on westbound Marinelli Road would also be moved back to allow a crosswalk to occupy the new desire line to the bus stop and NRC headquarters across the street.

As White Flint develops into a more urban area, Montgomery County will need to begin to treat the needs of pedestrians as more important than those of drivers. If Rockville Pike remains as hostile to pedestrians as it is now, no amount of density will turn White Flint into an urban center.

Our experiences around the Washington region have taught us that opening a Metro station has the potential to completely change the local economic systems, provided that the government and landowners take advantage of their infrastructure investment. However, the Gazette article shows that the investment in transit is not being leveraged:

With a new high-end apartment and condominium complex being built on Layhill Road, the raising of Georgia Avenue over Randolph Road and the move of the fire station to the Glenmont Metro, where a new, 12-floor parking garage is being built, residents are holding out hope that a sparkling new shopping center could be just a few years away.

One can't emphasize enough that an elevated highway and a walkable neighborhood in the same space are mutually exclusive things. If you only plan for cars and traffic, you get cars and traffic. That is just as true in Glenmont as it is anywhere else.

The landowners of the Glenmont Shopping Center appear to be far less business savvy and enlightened than the coalition of landowners who cooperated to plan for the recently passed White Flint Sector Plan that envisions a new human-scale town. It appears from the article, that there is none of that kind of cooperation going on in Glenmont:

Karen Durbin, the manager of Arcade Florist, has been selling flowers to shoppers since 1969. When asked how the shopping center has evolved over the years, she laughed as a co-worker slowly dropped a thumbs-down.

"The problem here is that there's a lot of different landlords, and they don't cohesively get together, Durbin said. "...Major renovations? The only thing I ever see them do is work on the parking lot."

As more and more new projects are completed in the immediate area that leverage their proximity to the Metro, the Glenmont Shopping Center will become more and more of a weight around the neck of revitalization.

If the shopping center gets a street grid as a result of a suburban-to-urban retrofit, there will be more connectivity with the surrounding small streets like in the White Flint Sector Plan. People living within walking distance of amenities in a new mixed-use development adjacent to the Metro will contribute to reversing the whirlpool of induced demand.

If the demand for road space could be better managed, Montgomery County wouldn't have to build the overpass for Randolph road over Georgia Avenue. (Sadly, the county DOT's Level of Service traffic metrics will always recommend building more roads.) The county would get tax revenue from redevelopment because walkable urbanism has more billable floor space per unit land area, and also a smaller road bill. I wonder why no one thought of it, despite the fact that it has already been done within Montgomery County in Bethesda, Silver Spring, and soon White Flint.

Montgomery is very lucky that the landowners in the White Flint Sector Plan area are forward-thinking enough to cooperate to improve environmental sustainability while increasing their long term profits. Clearly, the county is not as lucky in Glenmont. I have never met the landowners of the Glenmont Shopping Center. I do not know how they view their commercial rental property. However, I do know that any profit-seeking private business is motivated by improvements to their own bottom line. They stand to make a fortune in either redeveloping their property as a mixed-use town or by selling it to someone who will. The article in the Gazette demonstrates a lack of vision in the area. However, the county needs to provide zoning and planning support to make something happen.

Developers are profit-seeking businesses just like any other. It is up to the citizenry, through its elected officials in government, to set up a business environment that incentivizes developers to do the right thing. The landowners in White Flint had to jump through hoops to do the right thing. The status quo will not produce more transit-oriented, sustainable, human-scale towns. We can do better than dreaming of a more sparkly 1960's era strip mall flanked by a Metro station on one side and an overpass on the other. That's just putting lipstick on a pig. The opportunity costs are too high to waste the investment of the Glenmont Metro station.