MTA believes many of the Schwartz study "findings" are in error. The Secretary of Transportation first answered some of the claims the Sam Schwartz study makes in a May 27 letter to the Town. A July 8 MTA briefing to the Western Montgomery County Citizens Advisory Board Transportation Committee addressed more of the issues. MTA Purple Line project Manager Mike Madden has also released an informal memo addressing some more recent assertions from the Town about the Trail. MTA is trying to schedule a meeting with the Town in a few weeks, and will be releasing a lengthy technical report that addresses the study assertions in detail.
I won't get into the Schwartz vs. MTA assessments of the effectivenes or BRT on Jones Bridge Road here. But Sam Schwartz makes claims about the impact of the Purple Line on the CCT that I must challenge. The questions that most concern me are:
- Why does Schwartz portray the safety restraint structures on the top of trail ramps and on the elevated trail structure in the Bethesda tunnel as solid walls, when chain link fences and cages are more than adequate for safety and more typical for elevated trail structures?
- Why does Schwartz assert a trail ramp to elevate the trail at the east end of the Bethesda tunnel must be 1200'+ long to meet ADA requirements, when only 500' is needed to meet ADA requirements?
- Why does Schwartz assert the trail effective width will be less than 10' in many places while MTA finds they can and will provide a full 10' wide trail with 2' clearance on both sides throughout this entire area?
The Schwartz choice of solid walls instead of chain link fences for safety on elevated structures especially troubles me, because it suggests an unfair bias. This is most evident in the difference between MTA and Sam Schwartz' concepts for the elevated trail structure in the Bethesda Tunnel. Let's start by being realistic about the condition of the trail in the tunnel now:
The tunnel is dimly lit and not attractive. Trail safety from crime is provided mainly by "eyes on the trail" of other trail users.
If the Purple Line is built, then the trail would need to be in an elevated structure in the tunnel. The MTA concept for this is presented on the MTA website:
The clearance between fences is proposed to be at least 14'.
The choice of a fence for safety in this concept is important. A fence would allow trail users to see and be seen by transit users at the station below. Since MTA estimates there will be over 13,000 people boarding transit at this station every day, the number of "eyes on the trail" will be over 10 times that in the tunnel today. Riding a bike on this elevated structure will be like riding along a long balcony, with a view below through a chain link fence along one side for the length of the tunnel.
Now let's see Sam Schwartz' concept for this elevated structure, as he presents it in his Town study:
The clearance between walls is stated to be only 10'.
Having selected solid walls to enclose the trail on both sides, the trail is totally cut off from the transit station below. Sam Schwartz then goes on to claim the trail will be too "tomb-like". Well, yes it will be. If his design is used.
Why would Schwartz ignore the most common, and far cheaper, use of fences for safety on elevated trail structures and instead show solid walls in his concepts? Chain link fences are everywhere on trails, including very nearby on the CCT:
Imagine crossing River Road on the bridge, above, if the fences on the ramps and the chain link cage on the span were replaced by all solid walls. I'll take the chain link fence any day. Be thankful Sam Schwartz did not design this bridge!
Pat Burda, the Chair of the Long Range Planning Committee of the Town of Chevy Chase, forwarded a list of my questions to Sam Schwartz, who then gave detailed answers in a memo response. I followed up with another memo to Pat Burda detailing why I felt Schwartz' answers fell short. Sam Schwartz continues to defend his solid walls. He asserts that a chain link fence or cage could not provide adequate protection between trail users and the electric wires that would be about 10' away over the north side transit tracks. Schwartz does not explain how trail users would touch the wires through a chain link fence. Are we to believe people are at risk from sticking a 10' pole through the fence to touch the wire? What would prevent people from using that same 10' pole to reach up and touch the wire from the station platform below? Have people been using 10' long poles to reach out and touch any of the thousands of wires along thousands of streets where street cars have been operating around the world?
The other trail questions that I raised with Sam Schwartz, such as the length and width of the proposed ramp at the east end of the tunnel, followed a similar pattern in our memo exchange with Schwartz always taking the most severe trail design. I am left with the belief that Schwartz displays a definite bias toward making the impact of the Purple Line on CCT appear to be as severe as possible.
This long memo exchange with Sam Schwartz about his trail designs misses the larger issue: Any study of the trail that is limited to the Town of Chevy Chase will be severely biased by its scope. The Town asked Schwartz to consider the impact of the Purple Line on only the short section of the CCT at the Town, west of the Country Club, even though the BRT on Jones Bridge Road option the Town is promoting would place buses alongside all of the trail east of Jones Mill Road.
making the study very incomplete.
As I concluded in my memo to Pat Burda:
"But by far the greatest bias in Sam Schwartz’ study is not Sam’s fault. The Town of Chevy Chase limited the scope of the study to examine the impact of the Purple Line on only the short section of the future CCT adjacent to the Town, from Woodmont Avenue to the Country Club. This is a segment of the future CCT where the impact is worse than typical, due to the worse than average constraints at the Bethesda tunnel. Any study that examines only this section will conclude the Purple Line impacts are on balance negative, but will be very incomplete."
"The future CCT will extend 4.4 miles from Woodmont Avenue to Colesville Road. If Sam Schwartz had extended his study only a few feet east into the Columbia Country Club, he would have found a trail that is now constrained to be only 16’ wide between high chain link fences in places, and with a 100’ right-of-way available for transit and trail. If Sam had extended his study east of Jones Mill Road, he would have found that over half of the future CCT, 2.4 miles, lies east of Jones Mill Road and would not be spared from the impacts of the BRT on the Jones Bridge Road alternative alignment. If Sam had continued east to my Woodside neighborhood and to the Silver Spring CBD he would have found a long section where the interim CCT is still on road with at-grade crossings of busy highways, and where the Purple Line is needed to complete the trail as an off-road trail. The impacts of transit on the trail will be on balance very positive in this section, balancing against the negative impacts at the Town of Chevy Chase. The future of the trail is as important in Silver Spring as it is in the Town of Chevy Chase."
I go on to ask that Sam Schwartz take the Trail Ride with me:
"Pat Burda is suggesting Sam and I try to meet when he is in the area in late July. I do not object to a meeting, but doubt that it will be productive if we only rehash this discussion. I propose that since Sam is an avid cyclist, he might find it much more productive to do a quick tour with me by bike, of the 4.4 miles of the future CCT between Bethesda and Silver Spring. I have a decent bike I can loan him, and the round trip can be done in 2 hours including time for stops along the way to check out Purple Line issues. Sam needs to see the rest of the future CCT before he can put the impact of the Purple Line on the trail into proper perspective."
Stay tuned - I'll let you know if Sam Schwartz agrees to get out of Chevy Chase to see the rest of the future Trail.
1 comments:
Further benefit of the combined light rail/hiker plan for CCT should include reclaiming for public use the 100 ft right-of-way for the CCT which currently continues for the exclusive use of the country club. Only then can the reasons for the alliance between the Town and the country club support for the Jones Bridge Rd. alternative for the Purple
Line. It appears as though a "community" consideration is involved. However, what about the larger community currently served by the CCT? What about the non-stop traffic already endured by the country club's northern neighbor which is bordered by Jones Bridge Road, the Chevy Chase Valley community? What about the member families of CCRA, and the families who must transport their very young children across Jones Bridge Road to the Outdoor Nursery School? These two facilities serve the larger Chevy Chase community, not just the Town! Jones Bridge Road already stresses
the commuters of Silver Spring who must compete with Beltway traffic at the Jones Bridge Rd/ Conn Ave intersection.
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