Late last month, Maryland SHA updated the College Park City Council on projects within the city. Of particular note were a couple of projects on Route 1 and a redesign of the intersection of Rhode Island Avenue and Greenbelt Road.
The Route 1 projects will add "four-foot wide bicycle compatible shoulders" from College Drive to the Beltway
Project planning was completed in November 2005. The US 1 Corridor improvements were broken into 3 project segments to facilitate implementation: Segment 1 - College Avenue to MD 193; Segment 2 - MD 193 to Hollywood Road; and Segment 3 - Hollywood Road to I-95 / I-495. Segment 1 (PG624_21), is fully funded for construction. Final design, right-of-way acquisition and construction phases for Segments 2 and 3 will proceed as funds become available.
Design [of Segment 1] is approximately 90% complete and the right-of-way acquisition process is underway. The team is working on getting SWM approval and utility coordination. We expect utilities to start relocations this summer and anticipate a NTP date of 10/8/2018 for construction. The estimated open to traffic date is December 2021. The project is funded for design, right-of-way, utilities, and construction.
The other project isn't included in the presentation, but according to the Diamondback it was discussed anyway.
The SHA also plans to make safety improvements at the Route 193 and Rhode Island Avenue intersection, which is located near a 7-Eleven and the Branchville Volunteer Fire Company. The SHA plans to shorten long, concrete islands at the intersection, Mookherjee said. Construction is estimated to begin by summer 2017 and end by the winter, she added.
After the council viewed a map of the intersection proposal, Wojahn noted that bicycle infrastructure at that location still seems to be lacking. The intersection crosses the Trolley Trail, which bikers and pedestrians use to travel.
"This is essentially the bicycle backbone of the city," Wojahn said. "It looks like the bike lane there is a little bit of an afterthought."
On the south side of the street, it doesn't look like bicycles have anywhere to go once they get out of that bike lane, he added.
"Right now you have a curb there — either you have to go around and down over the median where the pedestrians are going … or go straight down and go over the curb there," Wojahn said. "There's got to be a better way to do that."
Mookherjee said the bike lanes depend on where the right-of-way lanes are located, and that the SHA would discuss Wojahn's bike lane concern with the project's designers.
In a follow-up this month, the Diamondback reports that the new design will
include implementing shortened concrete medians between opposite traffic lanes, as well as creating perpendicular crosswalks,..These medians will also narrow the road, which will, in turn, decrease traffic speeds
What's not clear to my reading is where these medians are. I assume they're talking about adding medians to Greenbelt Road, but then I don't know why they're shortened, since there aren't ones there. Nor do I understand where the crosswalks will be, since crosswalks alreday exist.. Unfortunately, I couldn't find any renderings or plans online.
In addition to this redesign, the city and State Highway Administration also blocked access to Rhode Island Avenuefor drivers traveling westbound toward Route 1 on Greenbelt Road a month ago, Brennan said. The move was meant to improve safety for bicyclists, pedestrians and automobile traffic.
The median havens will be a huge safety improvement for crossing Greenbelt Road on the Trolley trail.
You're right, they don't currently exist, so SHA was referring to shortening them relative to their first internal design.
The work is going to be done by District 3, which means they can bypass all of the central SHA bureaucracy that kills or delays all good things.
Posted by: Greenbelt | March 08, 2017 at 01:53 PM