Man vs. Nature on the Greenways
The recently approved Germantown Sector Plan recommends greenways along Observation Drive and Crystal Rock Drive that would connect Black Hill Regional Park to the Town Center. It’s a good fit on streets that already have wide sidewalks, buffers, and stormwater management facilities.
Sounds like a great feature, one that creates a distinctive roadscape, creates a desirable recreation feature that also works for bicycle and pedestrian transportation, and can be implemented at the same time road and site improvements are made.
a proposed green transportation and recreation route
Fitting recreation into existing infrastructure and making that infrastructure do double duty is a sensible approach, given not only public sector’s fiscal limits, but our increasing interest in sustainability. Just google greenways and you’ll find lots of communities pursuing them one link at a time.
- Knoxville has more than 41 miles of paved greenways.
- Central Indiana has 59 miles of trails, with plans for a 200-mile network.
- New York City has three greenway trails, including the Hellfighter mountain bike trail in Highbridge Park.  (http://www.nycgovparks.org/parks/highbridgepark).
- Nashville’s expanding greenway system (overseen by a private, not-for-profit group) includes the 810-acre Shelby Bottoms Park along the Cumberland River.
These communities, whether dense and urban or suburban, recognize the dual nature of a greenway; that it is a natural place, with a transportation and recreation function. They use them to connect neighborhoods and to create transportation routes.
Boston's Rose Fitzgerald Kennedy Greenway wends through downtown on the path of the old Central Artery highway. It is a green respite and a draw for cyclists (even on a rainy day!)
So how does Maryland address greenways? The priority seems to be using them as environmental resources. Click through to Montgomery County and you’ll see that most of the greenways are based in the natural environments of the stream valley parks, but include recreation and transportation corridors like the Capital Crescent Trail.
The Maryland Department of Transportation has completed a state wide bike route survey (nearly 70 percent of Montgomery and Prince George’s County state roads earn a grade of C or lower for user comfort) and has programs to retrofit streets with bike improvements. It also “shares responsibility for building and enhancing many of the State’s long-distance trails and greenways…”.
By starting in one place—natural environments—and morphing into another—recreation and transportation are we fully thinking out the benefits of each, and where they complement and conflict?
Summer Streets
It’s a cool morning, the first in a long time, and the frayed leaves are starting to look less lush, but there’s still time to think about Summer Streets, New York City’s program to create a temporary 6.9 mile car-free route to encourage bicycling in the city.
Picnics, pools, and a car-free Park Avenue are part of a flexible way to use the City's infrastructure
Free bike rentals and repairs, free skate rental, rest stops, maps, and yes–you can cool off in a dumpster pool!–remove barriers and excuses.
I like the idea of temporarily rethinking the city. Trying out parks and bike routes is not only a physical test of infrastructure, but a test of how we function as individuals in our environment. Certain things are hard–biking, recycling, walking–not because they are inherently difficult, but because the infrastructure isn’t set up to support them.
What I Did on My Summer Vacation
guest blogger: Michael Brown
Imagine, in an effort to reduce spending, Montgomery County Public Schools has decided to reduce the number of students they will bus to school. As a consequence, more children will be forced to walk to school or more parents will be forced to drive them.
This is the reality of parents in Clayton County, Georgia, a suburban community south of downtown Atlanta. Just days before the new school year started, the school system announced that itwill no longer provide bus transportation to 4,600 students living within a mile and half of their schools.
After hearing this news my first thought was TRAFFIC!   As a reviewer of mandatory referral applications for school projects in Montgomery County, I hear from property owners near schools who fear additional traffic associated with school additions and renovation projects. They remark how parents double park, block access to driveways, and congest the roadway during morning and afternoon rush hours. With the potential for more parents driving their children to school, access and congestion would only get worse.
My second thought was the safety of those children walking. The Planning Department works closely with MCPS project managers to ensure safe pedestrian routes to building entrances. However, in some cases, a complete pedestrian system–sidewalks and trails–is not present throughout the neighborhood. Some As a result, there have been cases where the sidewalk abruptly stops at the schools’ property line.
The safety of children walking is even more of a concern when schools are located on major thoroughfares. Sidewalks may be present, but what adult (not to mention child) feels comfortable walking next to rush hour traffic?
“Bobby” and his friend are mannequins the size of a 10-year-old child used by the Montgomery County Department of Transportation to illustrate the hazards of crossing the street in heavy traffic.
We are fortunate in Montgomery County to have initiated programs (click to see how Bobby gets across the street) and studies to create safe walking environments that provide a viable alternative to driving. But I wonder are we doing enough? Are we making changes fast enough to address those traffic and safety concerns surrounding our schools in Montgomery County? Even if Clayton County found money to bus those 4,600 students, is that a sustainable solution?
Capital Bikeshare Begins
DC has taken an early step in becoming a more bike-friendly community (a la Montreal). See the press release below:
Sign Up Today for Capital Bikeshare
Discount Memberships Now Available at www.capitalbikeshare.com
Become a Founding Member
(Washington, D.C.) – Cyclists in the Washington area can now sign up in advance for Capital Bikeshare, the regional bikesharing network that is scheduled to start service in September in the District and Arlington, Virginia. The program’s website is now live at www.capitalbikeshare.com and by signing up online now individuals can take advantage of a special introductory offer.
Here are the details:
- For a limited time, Capital Bikeshare is offering annual memberships for $50. That is $25 off the regular annual price.
- In addition, the first 2,000 “Founding Members” will receive a limited edition Capital Bikeshare key and a Capital Bikeshare t-shirt.
- Monthly memberships are also available for $25 online and daily memberships will be offered for $5 at station kiosks once Capital Bikeshare begins service next month.
- Â When you sign up, your credit card will be charged, but your membership will not be active until Capital Bikeshare begins to operate.
- Â A $101 preauthorization hold is placed on new accounts. The hold can last for up to 10 days, depending on the credit card company. Please note that using a debit card may result in overdrafts if you don’t have sufficient funds in your account to cover the hold.
- Membership packets will be mailed in early September, in time for the launch of the system.
One thousand bikes will be available at 100 locations throughout the District in all 8 wards as well as 14 more stations in the Crystal City and Pentagon City areas of Arlington County. The station locations are still being finalized. Visit www.capitalbikeshare.com for more information.Â
The annual, monthly, and daily memberships allow for an unlimited number of rentals during the membership period. The first 30 minutes of every trip is FREE. After the first 30 minutes of free use, members will be charged a usage fee for each additional increment of 30 minutes as follows:Â
- The second half hour will cost $1.50
- The third half hour will cost an additional $3.00
- Each subsequent half hour will cost an additional $6.00
(The pricing structure is intended to encourage shorter trips rather than all day rentals.)Â
For regular updates follow us on Twitter at www.twitter.com/bikeshare and Facebook at www.facebook.com/CapitalBikeshare.
Qu’est que c’est Bixi?
Bixi is Montreal’s homegrown rental bike system. Designed to serve tourists and residents with more than 5,000 bikes distributed through the city, the program is a real commitment to urban biking. Price and convenience contribute to their use and the system is well-managed to local habits—bikes are trucked around the city to ensure their even distribution after rush hour trips downtown.
Tourists can rent a bike for $5.00, residents can rent for a whole year for $78
But I think the real reason people bike in Montreal is the 502 kilometers of bike lanes and bike routes. Some are painted on the street, some run through parks, and some are separated by curbs, but all are well-respected and well-used.
concrete lane markers and no parking make this clearly a bike space
Yes, even in the winter, though not without challenges. The commitment to bike infrastrucutre has created a bike culture that reaches not only across the city, but across the country.
Riders through Montreal can connect to a countrywide bike route or just ride down the hill to work. Coffee, croissants, and air pumps are avialable all along the routes
And, Bixi is coming to Washington DC and Arlington,VAÂ this fall.
What are the Bixi opportunities in Montgomery County? I can easily see bike stations located at Metro stations and at park/trail points like the Capital Crescent Trail, but once you get the bike, where do you go? Does anyone really want to bike up Wisconsin Avenue in its current cross-section?
It’s one thing to map the bike routes, another to ride them. As Casey Anderson pointed out in his Rethink presentation, potential riders are afraid of car traffic, but even those who would never consider riding a bike think it’s worthwhile to invest in bike and pedestrian infrastructure. Bixi in the DC region may be a first step.
Food Truck Follow-up
When we think about urban environments we picture tall buildings, noisy traffic, and hard surfaces. But the real point of urban environments is people, lots of them, bouncing off each other—eating lunch in the square, going to the theater, crowding around a street performer, sharing a sidewalk. Cities bring people together.
Food also brings people together and one could think of urban spaces as giant family tables. After all, Napoleon didn’t describe Venice’s Piazza San Marco as “the finest drawing room in Europe” for nothing. A $15.00 lemonade at one of its cafĂ©s is worth every penny if you make good use of your plaza-side table.
La piazza di tutti piazzi
Community spaces and tables are prevailing in private spaces as well. Metropolis Magazine writes about restaurants across the country that are designing their spaces and menus to become what sociologists call the third place—the place that is not home or work—where you go to hang out.
Local restaurateur Jose Andres recognizes the value of communal celebration and includes a long community table in his restaurants and at Le Pain Quotidien, you may find a fresh baguette and a new friend at the communal table.
Combine food and people and you’re bound to get politics—or at least an interesting discussion around that communal table. In Pittsburgh, Conflict Kitchen serves “food from countries the United States is in conflict with.” Their façade creates a distinct street presence and their menu is as much about sustenance as communication.
Is there a way to use urban design of public space to create “third places” and what are the elements of a successful place? I can picture a communal table in the new Silver Spring Civic Building’s Veteran’s Plaza and imagine the conversations that could take place around it.
instead of a lot of little tables, how about a big table?
This Thursday, the Planning Board will review the County’s DHCA plans to upgrade the 25-year old streetscaping along Georgia Avenue between Selim Street and Silver Spring Avenue. The goals are to meet ADA standards and to install new soil panels that will help street trees reach full maturity.
But it’s more than a matter of setting in a few bricks and new trees. The design of the sidewalk space and its elements has to mediate among the needs of all users. Business owners want trees that don’t obscure their storefronts and signs. Curb edges and varied paving materials can hold up wheelchair users but can help blind pedestrians navigate. Agencies undertaking the work, trying to make the most out of taxpayers’ money, are looking for effective project coordination and maintenance.
The staff report’s recommendations address these sometimes conflicting needs. The proposed brick pavers will be set on a concrete base, “glued” in place with asphalt and finished with sand between the joints to create a surface with a minimal amount of heaves. It’s a technique that has worked well in the Bethesda CBD. The brick itself is has been updated by the manufacturer with a slightly rough surface that is less slippery for pedestrians but still smooth for wheels.
The new trees, American and Lacebark Elms have proven to be hardy street trees. Their high branching pattern will keep storefronts visible and the proposed amended soil panel will give them a fighting chance to develop a full canopy.
Coordination has been extensive on this project. DHCA has worked with Silver Spring citizens, property owners and Planning staff.   The Planning Board’s review will give citizens another chance to be heard.
This Week at the Planning Board
guest post: Valerie Berton
July 29 will be the last meeting of the Montgomery County Planning Board until September 16. The Board, which meets weekly on Thursdays, typically takes a recess every August. This year, the Board will stay on break through the Jewish holiday of Rosh Hashanah and reconvene in mid-September.
As you might expect, the Board’s agenda is packed on this last day before a six-week recess. On tap:
- A mandatory referral review of the proposed Travilah Fire Station, on 5½ acres at Darnestown and Shady Grove roads in Shady Grove. The proposed station is expected to serve Travilah, Traville, Fallsgrove and western Rockville. The Planning Board will provide comments to the county’s Department of General Services on the station’s design, access, landscaping, environmental concerns and any other site planning issues to the county.
- Downtown Silver Spring streetscape. In another mandatory referral review, the Planning Board will issue recommendations on the county’s upgrades to the pedestrian environment between Selim Road and Wayne Avenue – which covers most of the eastern part of downtown Silver Spring known as Fenton Village. It’s been 25 years since the county constructed the streetscape and these upgrades are intended to meet disability requirements and increase safety for pedestrians through sidewalk paving materials, landscaping and new curbs. Planners have recommended drought-tolerant plant species, brighter street lights and a wider mid-street pedestrian refuge that can accommodate shade trees.
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Georgia Avenue streetscape
- Wheaton Sector Plan public hearing. Planners have sketched out a vision for downtown Wheaton that encourages reinvestment and inviting public spaces as part of the proposed Wheaton Central Business District Sector Plan. The Board will deliberate the plan’s recommendations before sending it to the County Council. The first step of the Planning Board’s process is the July 29 public hearing at which residents, property owners, employers and others are invited to provide input on the plan recommendations that include strategies for revitalization and mixed-use development – housing, shops, restaurants and offices – and renewed civic spaces as a way to make a more walkable community.
Buses: Green and Cool
With low-cost, long-distance options like Vamoose, bus travel is on the ascendancy, especially when they can offer high-tech services like Wi-Fi. If we could apply some of that high-tech thinking to congestion management, they could really move.
A new COG survey has found an increase in telecommuting and a decrease in driving alone in the Washington metro region. Transit use is part of that equation–more than eight in ten respondents who live in inner ring communities live less than one half mile from a bus stop. But can they walk there easily and once they get there are they perched on the curb, rather than sitting under cover?
And if you can’t be green at least look green.
Parking Space
The I-270/I-370 interchange overlaid on the Woodmont Triangle
In March, one of our planners, Claudia Kousoulas, showed the difference in scale between urban development and the infrastructure underlying suburban development by overlaying the I-270/I-370 interchange on top of Bethesda’s Woodmont Triangle area.
The amount of space we devote to moving cars is almost surreal at times. At Montrose Road, Interstate 270 is a whopping 14 lanes wide. At that rate, it seems we’re trying to rival places like Atlanta and Los Angeles.
But what is even more amazing is the amount of space we devote to storing cars. When people think of the automobile, it is invariably involved in going somewhere. But cars spend the vast majority of their time parked.
In Montgomery County, we devote about 2.5% of our land area to parking. That’s more than 12 square miles. It’s slightly less than the amount of land covered by water in the county. Can you imagine the Potomac River, and the Triadelphia, Rocky Gorge, and Little Seneca reservoirs all covered in parking lots?
Perhaps more shocking is that the amount of space we devote to parking and driving exceeds the amount of land devoted to buildings in Montgomery County.
Buildings cover about 4.1% of the county’s land. But roadways cover 4.3%, meaning that we use 6.8% of the area of the county just to move or store automobiles.
Silver Spring is one of Montgomery County’s urban areas. There we find that 21.9% of the land area of the Central Business District is devoted to parking cars. Most of that area is surface parking. Only 3.8% of the land area of the CBD is used for structured parking. Another 16% of the land area is used for roadways.
In fact, four times as much area is devoted to surface parking than is devoted to parks in the Silver Spring CBD.
In White Flint, along the suburban Rockville Pike corridor, the numbers are even more extreme. I used the boundaries of the recent sector plan area to calculate the percentages.
There, some 45.9% of the land area is devoted to parking. Another 13.2% is devoted to roadways, meaning that 59.1% of the land area of the neighborhood is given over to cars.
Here, the lack of a parking lot district makes shared parking much more difficult. And that means that each business is providing more spaces than would be needed in a “park once” district.
All told, approximately 34.6 square miles of land area in Montgomery County is devoted to automotive transportation. If all the roads and parking areas in Montgomery County were placed in Arlington County, Virginia, they would completely fill Arlington, and there would still be 10 square miles of parking and roads left over. Or, placed in Washington, they would cover over half of the land area in the District.
Accommodating this sea of parking places a huge cost on both the public and private sectors. And it also has a major impact on the environment. But perhaps most notable is the opportunity cost of using valuable land in our activity centers for parking. In White Flint, despite the presence of a Metro station, 45.9% of the land area is devoted to parking. Only 17.7% of the land is used for buildings!
As the county grows more dense, the acres of parking in places like White Flint are becoming more valuable as potential sites for redevelopment. How we address the parking issue will have an enormous impact on the future of the county.
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