[RP TownTalk] District Council to Vote on Cafritz, Monday, July 9, in Upper Marlboro

[Jonathan W. Ebbeler]

The RP Town Council is the only authority who may make changes to town roads
(which Queensbury is one).  The Council may turn roads one way, put speed
bumps, rumble strips, restrict access at certain times or altogether, put
more stop signs, stop lights, or any other measure that is deemed
appropriate.  The State Highway Administration has that same authority over
MD-1/Baltimore Avenue, MD-410/East-West Highway, and MD-201/Kenilworth.  I
have not been privy to any conversations that indicated that Queensbury is
to be widened.  That would be antithetical to the M-U-TC zoning's purposes;
wider roads encourage higher speeds and are by their inherent nature
less-pedestrian friendly.  

 

To address some of the more technical questions that were raised:

-the traffic counts are a highly debatable number (there were multiple
studies done with different results).  Even the worst case scenario however
did not put the trips anywhere near 2000 additional trips on Route 1

-there are mandatory restrictions in place concerning new traffic generated
by the proposed development

-a new private shuttle will be funded by the developer to run between the CP
Metro/Marc, PG Plaza Metro, and RP Marc station

-all the traffic studies projected that many of the housing units will be
serving the offices at M2, UMD, and commuting into DC.  Much more traffic
was generated based upon the retail (2/3) vs. the residential (1/3)

-there are mandatory steps that have to happen prior to construction permits
including an Adequate Public Facilities study and a traffic study (for town
roads) that address infrastructure and public safety issues

-Route 1 at Van Buren will have a stop light with pedestrian crosswalks, the
Town Council and Public Works is aware and currently working on addressing
pedestrian crossing from Town Center to the Town Center Market

 

I walk to and ride the MARC train most mornings with 2 members of the M-U-TC
committee, three other members have the businesses at Town Center;
membership was specifically contemplated to include people who inherently
understand the local design and pedestrian issues that the zoning
contemplates.  Every application that has been before the committee has
focused its comments on two primary areas: 1) design and 2)pedestrian
orientation.  However, the M-U-TC committee itself can only advise on
pedestrian safety issues when there is a development application - it is up
to the Town Council to vote as a whole as to how to take the opinion.

 

The Council has moved over the last 12 months to begin to address these
concerns.  SHA has been brought before the Council multiple times to listen
to our concerns.  I would like to point out that a direct consequences to
this was the Rt1/Queensbury intersections being painted with at 'Don't Block
the Box' signage.  This by itself does not solve the problem but it is a
single step towards abating the problem.  I believe there should be red
light cameras as well and selective traffic enforcement.  For the
Queensbury/Town Center intersections we are awaiting the results of a
traffic study to better avail ourselves of solutions.  Keep in mind that the
town does not have unlimited resources; we have a maximum of 3 officers
patrolling every shift and pulling 1 or 2 officers to write traffic tickets
means other parts of the town and public safety are not being served.

I appreciate the general civility that has been shown.  I realize that there
are some that disagree with the development but it is always important to
realize that many of us are neighbors and friends and see each other on a
weekly basis at the farmer's market etc.  Disagreement is expected, and I
believe incredibly healthy in any discussion.  Any single issue as
complicated as the rezoning of close to 40 acres is going to bring up
enormous challenges, questions, concerns, fears etc.  It is important
however to move forward from any disagreement still as friends and neighbors
since although there may be disagreement on one issue there is likely to be
agreement on many others. 

 

Jonathan

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://riverdale-park.org/pipermail/towntalk/attachments/20120705/7f0be328/attachment.html>