Meetings – Page 4 – bikeSpecific

DDOT to Hold Public Meeting on the Reconstruction of Southern Avenue SE

Southern Avenue at Southview Drive
Image: Googe

The District Department of Transportation will hold a meeting Thursday, June 15, 2017, from 6:30 pm to 8:30 pm to discuss with the community the proposed reconstruction of Southern Avenue SE. The meeting will be held at the United Medical Center Hospital, 1310 Southern Avenue SE, Conference Room 2.

According to DDOT, the purpose of the project is to improve vehicular, bicycle and pedestrian safety by enhancing the existing road condition along Southern Avenue. This section of Southern Avenue is used as a connector between the South Capitol and East Capital Streets and tends to have vehicles traveling above the posted speed limits. Southern Avenue and Southview Drive, on the border of the District and and Oxon Hill, is number 2 of the top twenty-five most dangerous interesections.

The total approximately 1.4 mile project will have two phases: The first phase is from South Capitol Street to Barnaby Road SE, and the second is from Barnaby Road to United Medical Center on Southern Avenue. Also include in the project is the replacement of a vehicular bridge at the intersection of South Capitol Street SE over Winkle Doodle Branch.

The Wheels Keep Turning on the Long Bridge

Long Bridge Project Scope
Image: DDOT

At the most recent public meeting for the Long Bridge Study, the bazillion alternatives for the replacement of the two track span were reduced to seven. Of those seven options, a bicycle connection is included in three.

The Long Bridge project replaces, well, you guessed it, an aging long bridge. This bridge serves as primarily as a freight rail connector but also as a growing transportation corridor for Amtrak’s intercity passengers rail system and, the Maryland Area Regional Commuter Rail (MARC) and the Virginia Railway Express (VRE) commuter rail services.

According to the Long Bridge Project site, District Department of Transportation (DDOT), in coordination with the Federal Railroad Administration (FRA) are working cooperatively to complete a comprehensive study for the rehabilitation or replacement of the Long Bridge over the Potomac River, owned by CSX Transportation. The 3.2-mile study area begins in Arlington, Virginia and extends northeast, along the existing rail alignment in the District of Columbia, east of L’Enfant.

The Long Bridge
Image: Author

Specifically, the project corridor begins just past the I-395/Center-Leg Freeway, along the Virginia Avenue, SW viaduct past L’Enfant Plaza, and across the Potomac River at Long Bridge Park near Roaches Run. The project seeks to build rail capacity for 2040, when freight and passenger rail traffic would likely doubled from the current average of 76 weekday trains. This is the only Potomac River rail bridge that connects the District with Virginia, with the next closest crossing of the Potomac between Maryland and Harper’s Ferry, WV.

Long Bridge ‘Level 1 Concept Screening’
Image: Author

The objective of the May 16th “Level 1 Concept Screening” meeting was to receive public comment on the resulting concepts based on three screening criteria. The three criteria are Railroad Capacity, Network Connectivity, and resiliency and redundancy and contain several steps, conditions, and requirements. The criteria excluded tunnel options as they would be too costly or technical infeasible, options that included roads or street cars as those options do not appear on jurisdictional plans, or the selection of another crossing location as that would be impractical and wouldn’t serve the needs of passenger rail users and lacks connections for other modes.

The project considered 19 alternatives,
those highlighted in Green are the “Retained Concepts”
Image: Author

After the implementation of the criteria recommendations, the twelve alternatives were reduced to seven, with one being the required ‘no build’ alternative. The remaining six alternatives contain 3, 4 or 5 track-only options. Of those options, 3 included bike facilities. While there were no renderings at this presentation, crossing options for bikes could include spans that are connected or directly adjacent to the rail bridges or is an unconnected span several feet away. Bike infrastructure may exists beyond just the span over the Potomac. Planners state that bike connections and facilities could be included as part of the rebuilding of the viaduct and the L’Enfant VRE (potentially MARC) station; connections near the Tidal Basin and East Potomac Park; and direct bike connections to Crystal City or the Mount Vernon Trail.

Now in phase 3, the next steps include a Detailed Alternatives Screening from now until Winter 2018; a Draft EIS – Spring 2018 – Fall 2018; a Draft EIS Public Hearing – Fall 2018 – Winter 2019 (Public Comment) followed by a Record of Decision in the Spring of 2019. If you have comments on the alternatives use the comment form or email info@longbridgeproject.com.

DDOT Eyes Section of MLK Avenue SE for Revitalization

Current conditions near MLK and Milwaukee Pl SE
Image: Google

The District Department of Transportation (DDOT) will hold a public meeting concerning the revitalization of Martin Luther King Jr. (MLK) Avenue SE in Congress Heights. The meeting will be held at the R.I.S.E Demonstration Center, 2730 MLK Jr. Avenue SE, on Wednesday, May 31, 2017, from 6:30p to 8:00p.

This 1.1 mile revitalization project could be the first step in improving the bicycle network in this area: allowing youth to get to schools along MLK Avenue by bike; people to travel to and from the commercial corridor and the current and planned improvements at the St. Elizabeths site; and bike commuters who use MLK to connect to downtown by bike.

The aim of this initial meeting is to gather community comments about the street and present alternative revitalization options. Specifically, the project hopes to comply with elements of the #VisionZero initiative by improving the transportation network, reduce interactions between pedestrians and vehicles, and enhance the corridor’s aesthetics with street and sidewalk modifications.

The project corridor is one of the few streets that allow cyclists to connect with the rest of the District from its most southern sections to downtown. The #MoveDC bicycle plan proposed bike lanes for this section of MLK Avenue, from Alabama Avenue south until it meets with South Capitol Street. Those lanes were added in 2015 and travel mostly in a residential section of the corridor, starting just south of 4th Street SE. The area north of Alabama Avenue contains no bike lanes and contains the neighborhood’s commercial corridor. The project corridor contains at least 5 schools within two blocks of MLK Avenue.

As more people use bicycling as a transportation alternative, the need for bike lanes on major corridors has also increased. The project corridor contains one 10-dock Capital Bikeshare station located at Alabama and MLK Avenue SE. Two other Bikeshare stations lie outside of the project corridor at Atlantic and South Capitol Streets and near the Congress Heights Metrorail Station. Some residents and those who work near or along the corridor use bike share as the “last mile” connection to the Metrorail Green Line stations at Congress Heights, while some continue to the Anacostia Station or beyond.

Public Meeting for Pennsylvania & Potomac Avenues SE Intersection Improvement Project

DDOT will once again discuss alternatives for
this complex intersection
Image: DDOT

The District Department of Transportation (DDOT) invites you to attend an informational meeting about the Pennsylvania Avenue SE and Potomac Avenue SE intersection improvement project. The meeting will be Thursday, June 1 from 6:30 to 8:30 at the Hill Center (Abraham Lincoln Hall, 921 Pennsylvania Avenue SE.

According to DDOT, the meeting will allow residents, visitors, and those in between the opportunity to learn about, and comment on, the proposed design concepts associated with this intersection. Specifically, the project will look at how pedestrians can successfully cross as many as 8 lanes of vehicular traffic. This intersection is a hub for Metrobus, containing at about 9 routes as this location feeds the Silver, Orange, and Blue lines at the Potomac Avenue Metrorail station. Given the increasing transportation share of bicycling, DDOT may also include bicycling facilities, which were absent from earlier conceptual drawings.

Like so many projects, this isn’t the first time DDOT has looks at this particular intersection. After a series of community meetings, the initial scoping meeting was held in January of 2013 where DDOT and the public discussed problems associated with the area. This was followed by a November 2014, and a January 2015 meeting. The Final Environmental Assessment and Project Decision was to be issued in the Spring/Summer of 2016. While previous alternatives did not specifically include bicycling infrastructure, the public did. They included adding bikeshare stations, creating separate bike lanes through the intersection, additional bike parking, and adding wayfinding signage.

In 2014, Greater Greater Washington contributors Veronica (O) Davis and Brian (@gearprudence) McEntee discussed the three designs DDOT proposed: a oval, a square, or a parallelogram, otherwise known as an ellipse. The ellipse, they determined, created the most green space and reduces the number of bus stops from five to 4.

The Davis/McEntee perferred Alternative
Image: DDOT

The project is a part of the Anacostia Waterfront Initiative (AWI) Program, which hopes to transform the shores of the Anacostia River into world-class waterfront. This means that the control of this intersection isn’t under the complete control of DDOT but must also include feedback from the National Park Service, Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority, National Capital Planning Commission, State Historic Preservation Office, and the defenders of historic viewsheds, the Commission of Fine Arts.

If you can attend, please tell what happened or what you hope to see.

Public Meeting for Chestnut Street Concept Design Study Findings

Impediments
Image: Author

The District Department of Transportation’s (DDOT) will have a public meeting to discuss the Concept Design Study findings for Chestnut Street NW, from Oregon Avenue to Western Avenue. The meeting will be Wednesday, May 10, 2017, at the Chevy Chase Baptist Church, 5671 Western Avenue and from 6:45 pm through 8:15 pm with a brief presentation about the project to start at 7:15 pm.

This could be a great opportunity to add pedestrian and bike infrastructure to the Hawthorne area, which has a walkscore of 19 out of infinity and a bikescore of 35. The Hawthorne bikescore is basically lower than just about every other community in the District. If you can attend, please advocate for walking and biking. However, adding infrastructure in this upper, upper Northwest DC community isn’t easy.

If you feel strongly about adding bike or pedestrian safety infrastructure on this street, you should first read Sarah Stodder’s article from the June 2016 Washingtonian, “Everyone in This DC Neighborhood Is Freaking Out Over Sidewalks“. One of the unique factors of Chestnut Street, and many streets is the Hawthorne community, is that it has no sidewalks. In a disagreement more like the cold war than a “sidewalk war”, the neighborhood is fighting with itself, and with DDOT about fixing what should have been fixed years ago but more recently, to comply with the Vision Zero initiative, District, and federal laws.

According to DDOT, the purpose of this project is to “develop design solutions for a streetscape that targets multimodal, safety and aesthetic improvements along Chestnut Street NW”. With the word “multimodal” in the project description, one would assume that bicycling and walking are included – one could hope.

One of the easier bits of infrastructure to add would be wayfinding signage. DDOT hopes to hear from the public regarding this street, which provides a connector for bicyclists who travel from Rock Creek Park along Wise Road. The street connects with other roads to lead to Bradley Lane in Chevy Chase, Maryland, allowing cyclists to reach Wisconsin Avenue and points west in Montgomery County.

No Sidewalks. No Bike lanes.
Image: Google

This meeting on the Chestnut Street project should also be related to the design and reconstruction of Oregon Avenue NW. As reported by the Washcycle, on May 17 DDOT will also have a public meeting on the rehabilitation of Oregon Avenue from Military Road to Western Avenue. The meeting will be at 5601 Connecticut Avenue NW (Chevy Chase Community Center), but according to the most recent plans, Oregon Avenue plans will probably exclude bicycling facilities. This is doubly disappointing as the National Park Service supports including a trail along this section of road.

Having a safe connection along Oregon Avenue and Chestnut Street is important. If you can make it, you should, as it could be interesting. Let me know how it goes. If I get a hold of some plans, I’ll post them.