St. Elizabeths Public Scoping Meeting

GSA is holding a scoping meeting on Thursday, October 8th on the Environment Impact Statement and Historic Preservation Amendment to the DHS Headquarters Consolidation Master Plan. The Department of Homeland Security is making the west campus of St. Elizabeths into their headquarters and now they need to plan for compliance with the EIS and the National Historic Preservation Act (as I understand it).

Back in March I wrote about the Master Plan and some of the elements that effect cyclists, namely including a bike lane and sidewalk with the access road that will parallel I-295/Shepherd Parkway along the old rail spur to the southwest edge of the campus (but only in option 5). In addition I think they should

• Continuing the bike lane on to Malcolm X Avenue SE
• Building a MUP along the southern edge of campus, through the "forest preserve" to MLK Avenue at Milwaukee Place
• build a short connection from the Malcolm X Avenue connection to Newcomb St, SE.

I didn't write about the Transportation Management Plan. Here's what it includes about bikes. Under the Bicycles section they write:

According to the District of Columbia Bicycle Master Plan, there are currently several bikeways within the study area. There is a signed bicycle route that runs along Howard Road from east of MLK, Avenue to Poplar Point. There are also two multi-use trails, one along Suitland Parkway and the other along South Capitol Street north of Firth Sterling Avenue. It should be noted that when asked (as part of an employee travel survey), “ If you currently do not plan to walk or ride a bicycle to work in the future, what would encourage you to walk or ride a bicycle”, 14% of DHS employees expressed a concern about personal safety along bicycle trails in the Anacostia Neighborhood.

And later for Planned Bicycle Access Improvements

The District of Columbia Bicycle Master Plan Proposed Bicycle Facilities Map shows a proposed bicycle lane on Howard Road (from MLK Avenue to Anacostia Drive) and along MLK Avenue adjacent to St. Elizabeths (from Good Hope Road to South Capitol Street). A multi-use trail is planned on South Capitol Street from Suitland Parkway south to MLK Avenue and on Firth Sterling Avenue (from Howard Road to South Capitol Street).

Currently 1% of DHS employees bike to work, but they expect that to drop to 0% at the new campus with an ambitious goal of 0%. Hey, they've already succeeded. Beer and Ice Cream for everyone! If they hand out maps, work with DDOT, add showers and locker rooms and bike racks in the two parking garages they think they can get back to 1% by 2013 [Take that OPEC]. Again they write:

Less than 1% of the DHS employee population would be expected to ride a bicycle to work. Planned DDOT bicycle improvements in the area would help to facilitate bicycle access to the campus. Improved connections from the Oxon Run Park area on the Maryland side of the Woodrow Wilson Bridge (currently not planned) would be beneficial in improving bicycle access to the campus

The report mentions that 35% of all employees will take Metro. [Aside: one thing the report also mentions is a possible infill station on the green line to serve DHS. It "would require approximately one mile of new track and tie-ins at both ends of the existing track between Anacostia Station and Congress Heights Station" OR a spur from Anacostia to the National Harbor, with a DHS station having a connection to Congress Heights via a 2000' pedestrian tunnel with moving walkways.]

Finally they write:

New bicycle lanes are being constructed as part of the Woodrow Wilson bridge project; however, the bicycle connections are discontinuous on the Maryland-side of the bridge. Maryland-National Capital Planning Commission has reported there are no plans to improve bicycle access on the Maryland-side of the bridge at Oxon Run.

USCG has a bicycle club for employees that bike to work. Currently less than 1% of DHS employees bike to work. The TMP has not indicated a goal for bicycle users due to the lack of safe routes in the vicinity of the site. Local planning agencies including DDOT, MNCPPC, DCOP and NCPC should work together to add bicycle paths from the vicinity of the campus to the South Capitol Street bridge and off-road bike paths to the major roads approaching the campus.

My thoughts.

1. The Bicycle Master Plan in this area is out of date by the very virtue that it didn't plan for a DHS HQ at St. Elizabeths or even a DHS, so it's OK to break out of that a little bit now. It seems DHS wants to do the bare minimum required in the plan, even though more is clearly needed. In fact they go below the minimum as the TMP doesn't mention that a path along the rail spur was in the Bike Plan, so if they really want to adhere to the Bike Plan they need to include that in more than just option 5 (and then as a bike lane). And other items have changed. The bike trail on Firth Sterling was planned when DC thought it would get the CSX tracks there. That isn't going to happen. It's likely that there won't be a bike lane on MLK - not without narrowing the road; or if there is, it will be just a climbing lane on the southbound side. So, the bare minimum elements in the bike plan won't even happen and DHS seems OK with that.

2. 0% is not a goal. It is an acceptance of defeat. 1% isn't even a goal. Not in a city where 2.3% of people bike commute. 4% by 2013 - that's a goal.

3. They could increase the number who take Metro if they encouraged (with free bikes and bike lockers) employees to ride the short distance from the Metro station.

4. Why doesn't DHS consider encouraging DC and MD to connect to the Wilson Bridge. I recently had to drive down 295 and across the bridge. To connect to the bridge here is what you need.

• A short path from Overlook Avenue to the existing bridge over Oxon Cove.
• I-295 has 6-8 foot wide shoulders on the outside and similar sized ones on the inside. That's 12-16 feet extra. Shift the lanes over 2.5 feet and put a Jersey wall about five feet from the west edge of 295. That would create a 4 foot space. By no means ideal but it would work. Take that new lane from Oxon Cove all the way to the Wilson Bridge.
• Break a gap in the wall that separates the current Wilson bridge path from the shoulder and end the Jersey wall past that. Voila! Bike connection on the cheap.

5. Every Coast Guard officer I know seems to ride a bike to work, so I'm not sure why the rest of DHS can't. If the USCG bicycle club is successful, why not expand it to all of DHS?

Comments

[Froggie]

A flaw in your thought #4: FHWA requires shoulders on Interstates, and the standard is 10ft outside and either 4ft or 10ft inside, depending on if it's a rural or urban section...in this case, the latter. Furthermore, standard Jersey barriers themselves require 2ft of width.

[hopeless]

a wise suggestion, your #4 is! well done.

i ride out there all the time. the trick is to ride through the neighborhoods behind MLK over to the main drag (210? 214?) as it goes uphill -- it has a big shoulder. you can then ride all the way down the road to Indian Head, passing where the [racers] ran into each other in a car drag race on scattering 8 dead bodies were all over the road...first class act the highway admini is, the outlines ofthe bodies can still be seen on the road (at least when youre on a bike)...

of course, the population of people over there is barely competent, and certainly economically enslaved, so you have to keep your eyes open and be alert. if you want a good chance to endure some violence ride the path through oxon hill farm after meandering through the ghetto to get to it (and bring fat tires the path is joke of "pavement" -- kinda like the CCT the first two miles, or the Met Branch "pavement" behind Catholic up until the dump, albeit worse...what morons approve and supervise these type of SUB par pavings?!).

oh, by the way, your #4 will never be built for all the (non)reasons given by the previous commentator! long live bureacracy, as participatory democracy is dead (just go to anacostia to witness it...)

[Washcycle]

Froggie, is that a requirement or a recommendation? Clearly there is a waiver process as I-66's shoulders are open to traffic for part of the day, 295's shoulders north of Oxon Cove are significantly narrower than what you've suggested and I've seen Interstates in Arizona where the shoulder was a bike lane. FHWA rules would be the least of my worries.

[Washcycle]

And maybe I was unclear on the jersey barrier. If you place (or more accurately center) it 5 feet from the edge that would take a foot from the bike area and a foot from the shoulder (because it's two feet) thus leaving the 4 foot bike area I mentioned.

[Washcycle]

If there's 20 feet of shoulder, as you described I'm even more hopeful. Make that 6 feet on each side. That leaves 2 feet for the barrier and 6 feet for bikes.

[Froggie]

Wash: variances/waivers can be requested and made, but aside from that, it's a requirement. And it needs to be a very good reason why you're trumping safety in asking for the variance. Part of the approval for I-66 was twofold: the existing number of regular lanes needed to be maintained, and FHWA required VDOT to build "emergency parking areas" along the corridor.

Older Interstate highways (such as most of I-295, built back in the late 50s) were generally grandfathered in. However, any reconstruction or improvement projects involving federal funding require the road segment being worked on to be "brought up to code". I.e. the short part of 295 south of Oxon Cove that was rebuilt as part of the Wilson Bridge project.

Several western states (not just Arizona) allow bicycling on Interstate shoulders. But this is also twofold: often, the Interstate was built right on top of the old road, so there are no alternative routes for dozens of mines. And this is a case where state laws (with FHWA approval of course) dictate whether the shoulder can be used by bikes. Given that, in this region, you're rarely more than a mile or two from a "bikable alternative", I don't see allowing bikes on the Interstates to be a viable option.