CWL 2018 #12 Clarksville, MD to Manassas, VA

The first utility corridor on the list is a long one. Like really long. Like the name of this post doesn't actually do it credit. It's a gas corridor (or perhaps two) that goes south all the way to Moorseville, NC and north to Jacksonville, MD on the north side of Balimore. But for the sake of everyone's sanity I decided to limit things to the close in counties, which in this case means Montgomery and  Fairfax Counties. In both cases I push the corridor a little farther so that it can connect to worthwhile things, like the future i-66/Custis trail.  This corridor is the only one on the list  to cross the Potomac and be in two states (though plenty of other corridors do, they just didn't make the list). This section is 40 miles long, though the map shows the 35 miles north of it too. [On all the maps, Green is the line the post is about, Blue are trails already built on corridors and Red are other corridors without trails]

There are eight sections of the corridor that already have trails on them, three in the Rockville-Olney area and five in Fairfax County. One, the Gude Trail, even has a name.

Rockville-Olney

Filling in the two gaps between the pieces in the Rockville Olney area would create a 7 mile trail from E. Gude Road in Rockville to Manor Oaks Park in Brookeville. The new Montgomery County Bicycle Master Plan includes part of this as "Utility Corridor #4", which would extend the existing middle trail in Olney to the ICC Trail at Muncaster Mill Road. This would create a de facto connection to the Rock Creek Trail and the Gude Trail, using the ICC Trail and the trails around Lake Needwood. A better connection from the ICC to Rock Creek would be great, but obviously it would make sense to go around Lake Needwood. There is a golf course in the way of this trail, but it's on the section that MoCo plans for the trail already so they must think it is manageable.  And of course, this section meets up with another utility corridor in Olney that goes a few miles north and south. The MoCo bike plan calls this "Utility Corridor #3" and plans a 1.5 mile long trail on it centered on the intersection with this corridor.

South of Rockville

On the south side, the corridor first goes to the Potomac. It passes through Rockville, just past Montgomery College, on land that now has parking lots and subdivisions. It would be hard to build a trail on any of it, and then it would need to cross I-270. The one exception is on the west side of Montgomery Avenue, the corridor opens up there until it reaches the Millennium Trail. Then it runs into the Lakewood Country Club golf course. South of that, the corridor is fenced in to a lot of yards.

I'm not saying they own that land or the rights to it, but there would be a lot of people fighting a plan to put a trail literally in what they see as their back yard. At around Piney Meeting Road it opens up some more, but is still fenced in all the way to River Road. It would be a diplomatic challenge to put a trail on much of this, which is why it likely isn't in the plan. 

At River Road, the corridor meets up with the Potomac Water Filtration Plant and the Potomac River. I get that a bridge across the Potomac here would be tough, but not as tough as other places, and the location actually makes sense. It's about 1/3 of the way from Chain Bridge and White's Ferry, an area where there are no bike/ped crossings, so it would fill a big gap. It would be cheaper to build a crossing here than at the American Legion Bridge - though both would make sense. It would create a connection to an island in the Potomac that can now only be reached by boat (something NPS might see as a feature). It would connect the C&O Canal Trail with the Potomac Heritage Trail. And since the area is already clear of trees to make room for the pipeline, it would have less environmental impact than one located elsewhere. It might be the best place to build a new Potomac Crossing to Fairfax.

A bridge could connect on the VA side with local streets, but the corridor quickly becomes back yards and parking lot space again.

That changes around Georgetown Pike. From there it might be possible to build a trail all the way to Wiehle Avenue, and if Hidden Creek Country Club is redeveloped, to the W&OD Trail. That would require crossing Leesburg Pike and Baron Cameron Avenue, but there's already a small neighborhood trail on part of it near the Uplands Pool.

South of the W&OD Trail, the corridor runs into the Dulles Toll Road corridor, Reston National Golf Course and some more development that would make a trail difficult; but south of South Lakes Drive, a trail would be possible to add a trail all the way to I-66. 

This section already has some trails in it. In other places it might make sense to use existing paths in a similar corridor - like the bike lanes on Colt's Neck Road - but most of the way it could just be built in the corridor. Most noteworthy among the existing trails is the 1 mile one from West Ox to Percheron Lane and the 1.9 mile trail in the Cub Run Park area. Building along this corridor - and connecting across the Dulles Toll Road by building a real bike facility in the Reston Parkway corridor would create a trail system from the new I-66 Trail to Georgetown Pike, connecting to the W&OD Trail and Cub Run Trails. Furthermore, at Cub Run, the trail runs into another corridor that will be #9 on this list. 

None of this is in the Fairfax County Bike Plan.

North of Olney

North of Olney, the corridor starts to run into the back yard problem, but it might at least be possible to connect the existing piece to the Rachel Carson Natural Surface Trail. 

Then around Clarksville it opens up again for a few miles south of the Tridelphia Reservoir, though that section would need a bridge over the Patuxent River. But north of that, the pipeline goes under a lot of farmland - and crosses into Howard County.

The corridor is long, and it connects to the Custis/I-66, W&OD, C&O Canal, Millennium and Rock Creek Trails; giving it enormous potential. But the nature of gas lines is that they allow more development on the ground - mostly lawns, parking and golf courses - and so there is more conflict. In addition, crossing the Potomac is no small task - it's both costly and requires building on NPS land next to a secure facility.

At least Montgomery County has chosen to take advantage of the lowest hanging fruit. 

Comments

[Brett Young]

The one from Montgomery Mall to the C&O near Falls road and Cabin John Park isn't flat.
But it would be a very long trail.

[Purple Eagle]

I really like the idea of a bridge over the Potomac at that location.

[Crickey]

There is pretty much no chance of a bridge over the Potomac being built there. But a gondola . . .