From the ECG
The East Coast Greenway will be placing its signs on the National Mall in Washington, DC in late August, giving millions of tourists the opportunity to recognize the ECG route through our nation's capital. This sign plan stems from years of work and partnership building from DC Committee Chair Bob Patten and ECGA staffer Eric Weis. A special thanks goes to the District Department of Transportation and the National Parks Service for all their work in coordinating this effort.
And since I wrote this, the signs have gone up - the Post wrote about it here.
The alliance doesn't construct bike paths; it maps existing ones, a time-consuming process that includes field-testing. It's still in the early stages of putting up signs to guide bicyclists along the way, and members gathered in Washington yesterday to mark their paths along the Mall.
The signs may have been small, about four by 12 inches, but getting them in place was a big step for the alliance. To put them up in Washington, the trail's boosters went through a long process to gain federal and local approval.
"D.C. is a great place to put up signs," said Michael Oliva, who oversaw the route's design between New York and Washington.
In the District, bicyclists on the Mall need only contend with wandering tourists. Farther north, however, they contend with D.C. traffic, including one fearsome zigzag across New York and Florida avenues NE. "That's always been not a pleasant riding area," said Robert Patten, a volunteer with the organization who did much of the mapping in the District.
"A year from now, we'll have a trail up from Union Station" following train tracks and sidewalks north to Maryland, where the path will connect with the Capital Crescent Trail, Patten said.
Though the CCT is not a part of the Greenway.
The Greenway includes eight miles in the District, 163 in Maryland and 276 in Virginia. Signs mark about 27 miles in Maryland, none in Virginia.
Reaction to the signs was positive yesterday. Some bicyclists hadn't heard of the project but were intrigued.
And the Examiner covered it tool
Now there were about 150 elegantly simple signs showing the route of the East Coast Greenway from Union Station to 17th Street by the Washington Monument; Miller and Thomas would be back in the morning to strap more green, white and blue vertical signs to traffic posts, so bike riders and hikers could see a clear path along the Mall to Memorial Bridge.
“It’s important to the Greenway because Washington, D.C., represents the centerpiece of the entire network,” says Jack Keene, the organization’s trail coordinator. “It also sets an important precedent — if we can erect Greenway signs on the Mall, other cities will be more amenable.”
In the case of the Greenway around and through the nation’s capital, there are more gaps than trails.
Let’s take the Metropolitan Branch Trail. Designed to connect Silver Spring to Union Station along the Metro route, the trail was funded in 1998 with $8.5 million. A decade later, only three short segments of the eight-mile trail have been completed.
To connect with the East Coast Greenway system in Maryland, which takes riders north, the Met Branch has to go from Fort Totten to the Prince George’s County line through federal parkland. That short spur has been in the planning stages for 20 years.
Heading south, the Greenway’s Mall trail connects with the Mount Vernon Trail, but then it quits. An active Virginia trail group, headed by Dave Brickley, is working with the Fairfax County Park Authority to link the Mount Vernon Trail to the Occoquan River and south to the Williamsburg and Richmond.
The DC-Annapolis region represents the one area where the East Coast Greenway and the American Discovery Trail meet.
Speaking of cross-country bike routes, Virginia is updating its new highway map and it will now include National Bike Routes 1 and 76.
"We added two national bike routes that are in Virginia. I believe Virginia is the only state that has both of them in the state. That's National Bike Routes 1 and 76," says VDOT spokeswoman Donna Purcell Mayes.
Photo by qnr
Comments