|
|
|
Articles
|
| 11th Street Bridges plan sparks debate |
VOICE writes, "BY JULIE WESTFALL
The recent release of a several-inches-thick binder set off a round of spats between neighborhood groups and the District Department of Transportation over the proposed 11th Street bridges renovation project. The proposal calls for linking the bridges to the city’s freeways in an effort to remedy rush-hour congestion in the Hill East neighborhoods that surround the bridges.
Some neighborhood leaders balked at parts or all of the Transportation Department’s proposal to reconfigure the bridges, saying it would simply encourage more commuters to drive to the city and actually add to the congestion in their neighborhoods. The department’s plan is supposed to force drivers to remain on the freeway system, rather than take shortcuts through the neighborhoods, which some must do now in order to get back on some freeways and others choose to do in order to avoid freeway traffic."
|
“What we’re doing is we’re putting in place connections to first separate freeway traffic from neighborhood traffic and keep freeway traffic on the freeways,” said Transportation Department director Emeka Moneme.
Some neighbors have said the plan appears to allow for extra lanes on the bridges, but Moneme said, “The lane numbers don’t increase. [It’s] only the reconfiguration of the bridge that allows more continuity and flow.”
The long and complex environmental impact statement on the project, which assesses the proposed project’s total effect on the neighborhood and general traffic, did not sit well with some neighborhood leaders for multiple reasons.
Advisory neighborhood commissioner Neil Glick was perturbed that the Transportation Department seemed to be working hard to sell the long-term, $475-million-and-counting bridge plan when, he said, his constituents have not been able to get a stop sign put in at a dangerous intersection.
“How can I support this if I cannot support what my residents want today?” asked Glick at this month’s Southeast Capitol Hill advisory neighborhood commission meeting.
Others complained that the study was too segmented for such a small area, and therefore could not coherently predict how the bridge renovations would help or hinder traffic problems.
Alaine Perry, president of the Hill East Waterfront Action Network, complained that the study, though long and complex, was still not expansive enough, particularly because it did not factor in the redevelopment of Reservation 13, the 67-acre site of the old D.C. General Hospital. “I’m tired of having my neighborhood be the freeway,” she said at the meeting.
After a long debate, the Southeast Capitol Hill neighborhood commission agreed to support the plan as long as the Transportation Department implements traffic-calming measures on 11th Street and other Hill East problem areas.
But the Capitol Hill Restoration Society is loudly objecting to the plan and hired its own traffic analyst from a Vermont firm to do another study of the project’s possible impact. The analyst concluded that additional lanes would increase traffic and pollution, and the project would likely violate the National Environmental Policy Act. The analyst’s report also stated that the city’s multiple alternative plans are too similar.
“All of the alternatives will significantly increase traffic on the Southeast and Anacostia freeways, which will restrict future options from consideration for downsizing or avoiding increased capacity on these facilities,” the analyst wrote in his report.
At a hearing on the city’s bridges held by Ward 1 D.C. Council member Jim Graham last week, Transportation Department director Moneme said his department believes the plan’s aim is clearly not to increase congestion, even as the city grows and more cars come with the growth.
“As a matter of policy, we would not be looking to do that. We would not be looking to increase the number of single-occupancy vehicles,” Moneme said, adding that the project’s design would allow for future mass-transit options on the bridge, including light-rail, trolley service and bus and bike lanes. “We want to make sure what we build works, that people can connect to the freeways.”
The department’s chief engineer, Kathleen Penney, said more traffic is inevitable as the region grows, but the plan will decrease the number of cars taking shortcuts on neighborhood streets and causing bottlenecks to get on the freeway.
“With regional growth, we are seeing more traffic regardless of what happens,” she said. “What we’re trying to do is get some of that growth on the freeway, and off the neighborhood streets.”
But Dick Wolf, president of the Capitol Hill Restoration Society, said he is not buying the Transportation Department’s line. “I don’t think it’s true at all that there’s going to be such a reduction that people will stay on the freeway,” he said at the hearing.
More details on the plan are available at 11thstreetbridgeseis.com. The comment period for the environmental impact statement ended last week.
|
Posted on Nov 30, 2007 18:33pm.
(Return)
|
|
|
|
|
Categories
|
|
|
