Posts about NPS

In addition, parents pushing for a children's playground downtown are a lot closer to getting their wish. The new budget allocates $500,000 to plan and build a playground, which should be enough to get it built. The National Park Service still has to select a site and give DC jurisdiction to build the playground.

For many years, few to no people lived downtown, so DC's many downtown parks only served office workers eating lunch, the homeless, and otherwise little more than decorative backgrounds to drivers on major thoroughfares. Now, more people want to use the parks at all times of the day.

NCPC just released a a video about an effort by federal and DC agencies to renovate Edmund Burke Park, where 10th and L Streets NW meet Massachusetts Avenue.

Franklin Square represents the largest opportunity for downtown parks. It covers an entire city block, yet doesn't see the kind of use and programming as similar spaces in other cities, like New York's Bryant Park. DPR will get $300,000 to work with the Office of Planning to plan a renovation for Frankline. Since NPS controls this park as well, they will need to give DC jurisdiction here as well before any actual changes can come.

Most of the money for these priorities comes out of a $16 million project ($8 million in the next fiscal year) to create a new DPR and DYRS headquarters at Gibbs School. The committee doesn't think that's such an urgent need, as DPR just moved into offices on U Street. The budget retains $550,000 for them to continue planning for their office needs. The 4 staff working on parks will come out of 60 existing vacant positions at DPR.

The committee also assigned $500,000 out of $5 million which Mayor Gray had set aside to implement the sustainability plan. Parks and recreation are a key part of the sustainability plan, so this money will still contribute to fulfilling the plan, only in a specific way the Council chose.

Kenilworth-Parkside residents are hanging in limbo after DC tore down their old recreation center only to find out that contamination on the site prevents building a new one. It'll likely take 7-10 years, say committee staff, for NPS to finish its environmental study, for DC and NPS to negotiate over who has to pay for remediation, and then design and build a facility. The Council instructed DPR to use some of the money it already has budgeted for Kenilworth-Parkside to find a short-term option for residents.

People walking along 23rd clearly don't want to, and shouldn't have to, cross up to 6 roads just to traverse the circle. Instead, they cross where there is no light and then walk on the grass. Well-worn "desire lines," especially on the north and south sides to get to 23rd Street make this very clear.

Left: Pedestrian refuge at New Hampshire Avenue. Right: Path to 23rd Street.
Images from NCPC.

The National Park Service and DDOT want to fix this. Fortunately, instead of using the strategy of just fencing off parks to stop pedestrians, as they wanted to do for the triangle park at Q Street and the Dupont Circle Metro, the Park Service is doing the right thing: they will add walkways and move some.

Left: Washington Circle today. Image from Google Maps.
Right: Planned park pathway layout. Image from NCPC.

DDOT will add crosswalks and new signals that line up with the new walkways. After this project, every pedestrian crossing in and out of Washington Circle will have a traffic signal. DDOT also plans more signals and crosswalks on the roads between the circle and Pennsylvania Avenue or K Street, letting pedestrians cross directly in sensible directions.

DDOT plans for Washington Circle. Image from NCPC. Click to enlarge.

The plan also calls for a fence around the remainder of the circle. This will stop people from walking in and out at other places.

I'm not very enthusiastic about this recent NPS push for adding more fences. Down the street from Washington Circle, they're proposing another fence, also to "eliminate the creation of social paths," for the triangle between 21st, I, and Pennsylvania NW.

Instead of holding the existing layout sacrosanct, at Washington Circle, they are working to accommodate pedestrians. By placing crosswalks at the main places people want to cross, this traffic circle is about to get a lot safer.

Just two weeks ago, NCPC approved NPS plans for 5 stations on the Mall, at Smithsonian Metro and near the Washington, Lincoln, Jefferson, and FDR/MLK memorials.

They said the goal was to get one station installed before the cherry blossom festival. Not only did the cherry blossoms come quickly this year thanks to the good weather, but so did the station.

As it turns out, NPS and Capital Bikeshare exceeded that promise: a 2nd station, at the Washington Monument, is also active today.

Twitter user whiteknuckled surmised, "I predict the new Mall bikeshare station will either have zero docks or zero bikes at almost all times for the next few weeks."

It will be very interesting to watch the CaBi dashboard and, once it's available, the trip data to see how this station affects usage. At the NCPC meeting, Harriet Tregoning predicted it will spark a large surge in daily memberships, which are fiscally very healthy for Capital Bikeshare.

In other exciting bicycle infrastructure news, WABA reports that DDOT is installing bike lanes on Columbia Road today.

Image from WABA.

Someone riding south on the 15th Street lane has to merge into busy traffic and then cross the Mall either by riding on the sidewalk, which is often quite crowded with tourists and joggers, or in the road, where cars expect to drive fast and not encounter cyclists. The last time David rode there, a DC taxi pulled up right behind and started honking, even though there was another, mostly empty lane it could switch into. It eventually did, honking even more.

It gets worse around Maine Avenue and Ohio Drive, near the Tidal Basin. Not only is the pavement in this area in horrible condition, but those roads are configured like highways with cars speeding along the winding curves. The sidewalks are extremely narrow and packed with pedestrians, especially during warm, sunny weather and in Cherry Blossom season.

The pedestrians deserve to use that space, but what do cyclists do? Riding in the road is only an option for southbound bicyclists, and it's a harrowing experience with the curved yet high-speed roads and drivers traveling very fast.

Bicycle issues near the bridge. Image from Google Maps.

In the other direction, there isn't really a choice. From the path over the Mason Bridge, a cyclist has to ride on the sidewalks around the Tidal Basin, go the long way around west of the Tidal Basin toward the Lincoln Memorial, or take a long detour through East Potomac Park to get to the eastern side Ohio Drive and then head back up through the Maine Avenue area.

From Southwest DC, there's a path along the Case Bridge, which carries I-395 over the Washington Channel, but to get to it you have to navigate across and around highway-style ramps in Banneker Park, then 2 narrow switchbacks which force dismounting.

On the East Potomac Park side, the path turns into a narrow sidewalk along the on-ramp from the Park Police headquarters. Riders have to travel though the NPS parking lot (or go farther out of the way), then ride along the western Ohio Drive past the George Mason Memorial to get to the path.

On the Virginia side, the Mount Vernon Trail connects to many trails, but has no direct connection from the 14th Street bridge area to Pentagon City right across the freeways. Someone riding there has to either head north through Lady Bird Johnson Park and then wind around the Pentagon parking lots, or go south to the airport and then backtrack through Crystal City.

Alternatives improve Virginia connections

The Draft Environmental Impact Statement suggests 3 alternatives. The most ambitious, Alternative 2, proposes a new bridge from western Ohio Drive across the Potomac along side the Long Bridge (the CSX and VRE tracks) and then over the GW Parkway, with access to both the Mount Vernon Trail and Long Bridge Park.

The connection in Virginia seems great, but dumping cyclists in East Potomac Park isn't that useful. It's a little closer to the Case Bridge path, but not much, and getting to downtown or the Mall is worse than today's existing bridge.

The DEIS also contains 2 other, smaller bicycle proposals. Alternative 1 slightly widens and makes some changes to the approaches to the Mason Bridge path on each side, connecting to the Mount Vernon Trail and to the Jefferson Memorial. An earlier version also proposed widening the bike/ped path on the George Mason Bridge, but this bridge widening was removed from the alternative for "technical complexity." The final EIS ought to reconsider this option.

Alternative 3 has two parts. One would create better and more consistent wayfinding signage on both sides of the river. The second part proposes new trail connections to the Pentagon and in Pentagon City.

Around the Pentagon, a new connection would extend the half-built trail under the Humpback Bridge over to Boundary Channel Drive, providing a more direct connection between the 14th Street Bridge and the Pentagon. In Pentagon City, it would create a better bike connection from the north end of Crystal City (12th and Clark) west along Army-Navy Drive, under I-395, and along the south edge of the Pentagon Reservation to Columbia Pike and the Washington Blvd trail.

Proposed trail connections in Virginia. Labels added to base image from the EIS.

DC needs better bike connections as well

The Virginia connections would significantly improve access to the bridges, but there are no comparable bike connections proposed on the DC side of the river. This is the most glaring missing piece in the DEIS. The team should study and propose a better connection to 15th Street.

Drivers have direct connections in all directions here, even having too many ramps to too many roads. Cyclists, meanwhile, have one bad connection southbound from downtown and none at all northbound, and poor and winding connections to other directions.

This isn't just a recreational amenity. Many already use the bridge for commuting. Many more likely would for both commuting and general transportation if there were a clear, direct, and safe connection.

Ideally, we could find a way to extend the 15th Street cycle track from Pennsylvania down through the Mall, then past or through the Maine Avenue/Ohio Drive/East Basin Drive area up to either the Mason Bridge path or a new bridge.

WashCycle suggests extending the new bridge along the railroad tracks across East Potomac Park to the east side, where it's a lot closer to the mainland. Another option is to convert 1 lane on East Basin Drive (the 2-lane road from Maine Avenue to I-395 South and the Jefferson Memorial) into a 2-way bicycle facility up to Maine Avenue, and eventually connect through the Mall to the 15th Street lanes.

What do you think is the best way to create a connection between the Mall and downtown across the Potomac?

After the meeting, Peter May, Associate Regional Director for Lands, Resources, and Planning with the National Capital Region of NPS, approached us with his business card offering to join us on a walking tour to look at the property. We had already been talking with Councilmember Tommy Wells, who chairs the DC Council's commitee overseeing parks, and organized a group tour to see how NPS and the District could work together to build the much-needed playground.

The early December walking tour was an amazing show of cooperation on all fronts. Besides downtown playground advocates, May, and Wells, we had Bob Vogel, Superintendent of National Mall and Memorial Parks; Steve Lorenzetti, Deputy Director of National Mall and Memorial Parks; Daniel Connor, Deputy Director, DC Council Committee on Libraries, Parks, Recreation and Planning; and, members of the Washington Interfaith Network.

As a group, we spent over two hours walking around the neighborhood identifying potential sites for playgrounds and figuring out how to work together to make them happen. Almost all of the sites visited will require participation by both DC and federal officials, and in this meeting, we saw that such cooperation is possible.

Our walking tour included the four small pocket parks surrounding Carnegie Library; Milian Park, on the northeast corner of Massachusetts Avenue and 5th Street; Franklin Square, between 13th, 14th, I and K; and Pershing Park, on Pennsylvania Avenue between 14th and 15th.

Mt. Vernon Square pocket parks are best immediate opportunity

NPS officials felt that the 4 pocket parks surrounding Carnegie Library ought to have already been transferred to the District along with Mt. Vernon Square. Peter May said that the NPS would be willing to turn the land over to the DC government to accommodate play areas in those currently-empty spaces.

Mount Vernon Square and its associated pocket parks. Image from Google Maps.

The small parks have a lot of potential for varied use and would be a great way to enliven the overall space. They could become an attraction and leave the open lawn of Carnegie Library as a place to gather for picnics or other activities.

To make that happen, Mayor Gray needs to send NPS a letter requesting the land. Tommy Wells promised to ask the mayor for such a document. This will start the process of creating what will, with any luck, become a world-class play space near the Convention Center.

Why downtown needs a playground

Right now, there are absolutely no playgrounds in the downtown DC area. Since the area is only newly residential, there was little need for playgrounds years ago. As more and more children move in to the neighborhood, they need space to play where parents needn't fear they will run into the streets.

The problem affects more than just downtown DC residents. School children from the surrounding areas lack sufficient play space, too. It is ironic that the closest public elementary school to the White House, Thomson Elementary, has absolutely no outside space to play.

First Lady Michelle Obama's Let's Move Campaign has, as one of its primary goals, to get kids outside and active. Yet, these kids have absolutely no opportunity to do so. Moreover, the children in this school are at high risk of suffering from obesity, as over 75% of the students qualify for free and reduced price lunch. It is unacceptable that these children get absolutely no opportunity to play outside.

To appreciate the severity of this problem, all you have to do is walk around the downtown area in the mid-morning on any weekday. You are sure to see some of the hundreds of toddlers and preschoolers being walked around on ropes by daycare supervisors. Much of the time, those children are not headed for any particular location, because there is nowhere for them to go. Instead, the caregivers are simply walking them around the block, strung together for safety, day in and day out.

Regulations require that the children spend this time outside, but neither the District nor the federal government (which controls most of the open space in the area) is providing a place for them to go to play. Those kids who are lucky enough to be in government daycare do have access to playgrounds, but those are fenced in and closed to the public. As a result, many children spend much of their childhoods holding onto a rope instead of learning to run and jump.

Until our parks catch up with the rest of the world-class development taking place in our capital's downtown, we will never have a truly healthy neighborhood. It will benefit all of us to reprogram our park spaces to be useful and beneficial to all.

Although the need is clear, it has proved difficult to meet because many different entities control the park space in downtown DC. Much of the property is federal land. Some is District land, some is private land, some is federal land leased to the District, and some is federal land turned over to the District which in turn leases it to private entities.

As a result, Congressional oversight, historical considerations, and the need to reserve space for future memorials all complicate considering any change to downtown green space. In short, it will take a lot of cooperation among numerous entities in order to bring play space to the neighborhood.

We are very thankful to everyone for the time and effort that they have already put into this project and that which will be necessary to fully realize our goals. Every child needs access to a playground, and we are very happy that NPS and the District government are willing to work together to meet this need.

If you are interested in helping us move forward on any of these initiatives or have other ideas for play spaces in downtown, please join us for our meeting Wednesday, March 14th, 6 pm at Calvary Baptist Church.

Dangerous ped/bike conflict areas. Click to enlarge.

The best solution would be to make the sidewalks one each side of the bridge actually safe for pedestrians and cyclists. Unfortunately, that's almost impossible without actually reconfiguring the interchange to make it less like a cloverleaf.

The current curb ramps are very narrow and line up with sharp turns on the adjoining sidewalks, which is not ADA compliant. Cyclists can't easily navigate them. Fixing these would also help.

Meanwhile, there's a viable, and only slightly longer, third option: a bike and pedestrian work-around through Anacostia Park.

An alternate route. Click to enlarge.

While this option seems like the safest route on a map, it is not without its share of challenges. DDOT and NPS could make this safer and more inviting, and perhaps make it a more popular option.

1. Improve wayfinding at the entrance to the path

All photos by GeraldFittipaldi on Flickr.

There is a bike route sign at the start of the path. The sign is not visible if you are traveling eastbound on the bridge, as depicted in the photo above.

DDOT recently added wayfinding signs in Anacostia Park. However, if you aren't familiar with the area, it appears the path will only take you into the park. DDOT and NPS should consider adding a map at the entrance that shows how to access Pennsylvania Avenue SE via the park.

2. Repair the path

Having biked down this path, it is not a comfortable ride. The cracks and bumps on top of the steep slope can be intimidating for novice bicyclists. It's also dangerous for pedestrians with baby strollers.

In response, bicyclists have developed their own solution, and most going to the park prefer their carved path over the official one. This worn desire path has been here for years.

3. Make the area under the DC-295 bridges inviting

Once bicyclists and pedestrians enter the park, they must go under 3 bridge spans for 295. The sidewalks are in need of repair, and that could be a good first step. Another important element for cyclists would be replacing the in-line grates that can catch wheels and cause a cyclist to crash.

The bigger concern is the lack of adequate lighting along Nicholson Street SE and underneath the bridges. These photos were taken during the day. At night it is even darker. Brighter lighting and murals can enliven the area and make this route safer and more attractive.

The current interchange is really not designed to be safe for pedestrians and cyclists, and in the long run needs to be replaced with one that is more befitting its location in an urban area. Perhaps when the 11th Street Bridge is complete, some of the traffic from this area will relocate, but that alone won't solve the pedestrian and bicycle safety problem on the Sousa Bridge.

In the meantime, there are safety improvements that do not require expensive engineering solutions. DDOT and NPS can work together to make these low-cost aesthetic improvements throughout Anacostia Park to ultimately provide a safer route for pedestrians and bicyclists.

All photos are by Gerald Fittipaldi, P.E., a civil engineer from New Jersey, who met with me to discuss challenges to biking east of the Anacostia River. For additional photos, visit his DC - East of the Anacostia River album on Flickr.

They analyzed a number of options and condensed them down to 3 bicycle and pedestrian options, 4 roadway options, and 6 Transportation Demand Management options. This post looks at the roadway and TDM alternatives; the next one will delve into the bicycle and pedestrian options.

Vehicular options

One of the most significant conclusions from the draft EIS is what it chose not to recommend: More single-passenger vehicle capacity. The team looked at adding new general-purpose lanes (which, on a freeway-type bridge, aren't as much "general purpose" as "motor vehicle only") or HOT lanes. Once Virginia decided not to run HOT lanes through Arlington, the HOT lane options became moot, and adding new auto capacity generally did not reduce congestion.

There are 5 remaining proposals that would affect motor vehicles:

Add a bus lane. A lot of commuter buses drive to the Pentagon and then over the 14th Street bridge to DC, and many local buses also cross in this area. This alternative would use the existing shoulder of the Rochambeau bridge (the center of the 3 road bridges, which carries the express lanes in both directions) for a bus lane, and convert one lane on 14th Street to a bus lane.

The heavy volume of buses moves a great many people in this corridor. Helping buses bypass congestion and give riders a quicker ride would further improve the value of taking transit from many parts of Virginia.

Ban left turns at 14th and C (at a cost of about $203,000). C Street SW ends at 14th, in the last intersection with a traffic signal before the bridge. The study says that giving time for vehicles to turn left from southbound 14th onto C, or left from C onto southbound 14th, creates significant delay, and this option would forbid these turns. Drivers would only be able to turn right in or out of C.

Click to enlarge (PDF).

On its own, this sounds like a bad idea because it would move further away from a functional grid in this area, and make 14th more like a freeway. It could, however, be a reasonable way to reduce some of the extra delay that comes from the bus lane option, making that a little more palatable.

The most important question, which the report does not specify, is how this would affect pedestrians. People cross on foot to get to and from the Holocaust Museum, for instance, and already the signal here forces them to wait long periods of time for the various movements. Removing the left turns could allow more pedestrian crossing time, or it could make things worse, depending on the final signal timings.

DC should also add a marked crosswalk along the south side of this intersection, where there is none today. Every side of every intersection ought to have a marked crosswalk, regardless of its effect on traffic, but an animation of the proposal makes it appear that there would be no traffic effect with left turns prohibited, anyway.

For the final EIS, the team should investigate pedestrian crossings and suggest timings that help them cross more safely and with a shorter wait.

Restripe around Maine Avenue, 7th and 9th Streets ($185,000). There are a lot of ramps on and off in this area, creating a lot of merging and weaving. This option would narrow the on-ramp at Maine Avenue to 1 lane instead of 2, reducing the amount of merging on the freeway itself.

Also, it would add a solid white line between some of the freeway's lanes east of 9th Street. Drivers getting on at 7th Street would only be able to then continue to the 3rd Street tunnel (the one that goes under the Mall to New York Avenue, also signed as I-395), and drivers getting on from 9th Street would have to continue onto the Southeast Freeway (now signed as 695) instead. Drivers might ignore this line, but FHWA hopes it will decrease weaving.

Click to enlarge (PDF).

Remove some ramps on the Virginia side ($2.7 million). There are 10 ramps on and off 395 right around the Pentagon, also creating a lot of merging and weaving. This alternative suggests removing the ramps from 395 northbound to the GW parkway northbound, and the matching ramp from the GW Parkway southbound to 395 southbound. Drivers can still get where they need to go by taking Washington Boulevard (Route 27) instead, which is actually shorter, anyway.

In addition, this alternative would change around the ramps at Boundary Channel Drive, the access road to the Pentagon north parking lots. Now, there are cloverleaf-style ramps on and off of 395 southbound, so that cars coming from or going to each direction of Boundary Channel have their own ramps.

Instead, the ramps in the southwest quadrant would go away, and the northwest quadrant ramps changed so that cars can turn in either direction on and off of Boundary Channel.

Ramps in gray would be removed. Click to enlarge (PDF).

Arlington has proposed another option to add roundabouts instead of traffic signals at the ends of the ramps.

Potential roundabouts on each side of 395. Click to enlarge (PDF).

Transportation Demand Management options

Reconfiguring roadways is not the only way to reduce congestion. Transportation Demand Management is the field concerned with helping people better understand their travel options besides solo driving. Maps, real-time information, and public service ad campaigns can help people choose transit. Employers can provide incentives or assistance for people to carpool, telecommute, or commute outside peak hours.

The TDM options that the DEIS proposed to carry forward to the final version include:

• Expand incentives for telecommuting
  
• Expand flexible work hours
  
• Increase prices for parking and/or decrease supply
  
• Better coordinate among agencies along the corridor (Federal, District, state, and local) to share information and respond to crashes or other incidents
  
• Create a program to educate drivers in the corridor in "[crash] avoidance maneuvers and defensive driving skills"
  
• Make signs better and more consistent across the corridor

The study team is accepting comments on the draft EIS until March 15th. They will then begin work on the final EIS. I will send them all comments made on this post through at least the end of Wednesday, March 14. If you want to send them your own, more detailed comments, you can do so through this form.

The bicycle and pedestrian proposals, meanwhile, are worth a whole discussion on their own. Part 2 will examine these in detail.

The study looked at 4 options for widening the parkway in addition to a no-build alternative. Two alternatives looked at adding a lane in each direction in the median. The other two alternatives studied adding a lane in each direction to the outside of the roadway. Space constraints mean that any widening requires a combination of both inside and outside widening as well as rebuilding numerous overpasses and underpasses.

The difference between the two inside and two outside designs is in design standards. For each type of widening, the consultants looked at AASHTO-compliant standards and National Park Service standards.

The AASHTO options called for adding a 12-foot wide travel lane, a 10-foot wide outside (right) shoulder, and a 10-foot wide inside (left) shoulder. The NPS options included adding a 12-foot wide travel lane, an 8-foot wide outside shoulder with curb and gutter, and a 3-foot wide inside shoulder with curb and gutter.

Estimated costs ranged from a high of $565 million for the AASHTO outside widening option to a low of $343 million for the NPS inside widening option.

Despite the investment, though, the study shows that the Parkway would be just as congested as it is today by the year 2040. FHWA expects any increase in capacity to be matched by a corresponding increase in vehicle trips. A widened parkway would carry more cars, but it ultimately wouldn't shorten people's trips.

Widening the parkway is the wrong approach from a growth perspective, too. Prince George's County has long had a problem focusing growth in the "developed tier." Adding freeway capacity will only increase the pressure to build in parts of the county and the region that do not have the infrastructure for it.

Adding lanes to the parkway would also hurt the developed communities it passes through. In many places, it already forms a significant barrier between neighborhoods. More traffic and more pollution along the roadway will hurt many residents and the pastoral image the National Park Service believes the Parkway should exude.

Staff at the meeting stressed that further studies would need to look at options beyond just widening the parkway. Other options could include improvements to transit, other roadways, or spot "improvements" along the BW Parkway.

If any money were available for widening, it would be better spent on improving transit between Baltimore and Washington. Maryland could speed up trains on MARC and Amtrak's Northeast Corridor and add capacity for more trains, extend Metro's Green Line, or create incentives for carpooling.

As the region continues to grow, we need to focus on building livable and walkable communities. Widening a freeway encourages traditional sprawl, and it sends the wrong message about the region's priorities.

Comments on the study are still being accepted, though only for the next 2 to 3 weeks. If you have thoughts on whether the parkway needs extra lanes, you can submit written comments on the project's website.

The next step for the project team is to finalize a report to Congress showing the estimated costs, benefits, and impacts of adding a third northbound and third southbound lane to the roadway. Beyond that, it's up to Congress to decide whether to leave the Parkway as-is, undertake further study, or begin to plan for construction.