ENGLISH FOR CONGRESS POSITION
PAPER (Revised January 2012)
Washington/Baltimore Regional
Traffic Congestion
In November 2005, I attended the
National Capital Region Transportation Planning Board (TPB)
sponsored a forum titled "What if the Washington Region Grew Differently?" I was amazed to learn that,
other than the recently constructed Inter-County Connector, there
were no new major highways planned for the Washington area or
additional bridges planned for crossing the Potomac River.
These plan limitations were made despite the TPB's forecasts of an
expected 30% population growth in the Washington metropolitan
region by the year 2030. There was much discussion of
transit improvements and HOT toll lanes for existing highway
corridors, but no recognition of the fact that Washington and
Baltimore have no bypass highways planned for interstate coastal
through traffic similar to the I-295 bypass around Richmond and
Petersburg that has already existed for the past twenty five
years. Simple short-term transit solutions such as the
regional express bus system now operating in the Denver
Metropolitan area were not even considered. Instead, High
Occupancy Toll (HOT) lanes for the Beltway and other major
highways are now being constructed to speed the wealthy along
their way (i.e., "Lexus Lanes") with everyone else either paying
the extortionate tolls or sharing the increasingly
congested adjacent roadway lanes.
Rather than resort to unaffordable expensive rail transit or
exclusionary road user solutions, there are short term low-cost
express commuter bus alternatives that could and should be
implemented within the next five years to alleviate traffic
congestion and reduce the economic and social costs arising
therefrom. Dedicated bus and HOV lanes such as the Corridor
Cities plan should be constructed or expanded along major
thoroughfares to speed bus and HOV commuters to and from their
places of employment. Firms in major employment centers
should sponsor employer-subsidized express bus service to bring
employees to their worksites from specially designated suburban
and outer suburban commuter parking lots. A computerized
point-to-point origin/destination data base should be developed
for each major employment center to identify the numbers and
locations of employees’ residences and identify convenient parking
areas where they could board express commuter buses for getting to
work. Similarly, a dedicated express bus only (and
emergency vehicle) restricted traffic bridge should be constructed
across the Potomac River at Seneca to provide express bus service
between major employment centers on both sides of the river and
also provide express bus service to and from Dulles
Airport. The road network to Seneca already exists on the
Maryland side of the river and would need to be minimally upgraded
to handle the increased bus traffic.
In the longer term, planning should begin immediately for a
limited access express regional Eastern bypass highway that would
begin at I-95 North of Washington and follow the existing
Laurel-Bowie road corridor to U. S. 50 and from there parallel U.
S. 301 to the Potomac River. It would continue to parallel
to U. S. Route 301 through Northern Virginia until it connects
with the I-295 Bypass North of Richmond. Entrance and
exits should be permitted only at U. S.
50, Maryland Route 5, and U.S. Route 17 in Virginia to
prevent the highway from being overloaded by commuter
traffic. A post and beam bridging scheme with a specially
designed roadway runoff collection and wastewater treatment system
for protecting the Patuxent Wildlife Refuge along its route must
be incorporated into the project.
The Washington/Baltimore region also desperately needs a
restricted access bypass highway to route through traffic from the
Northeast toward the South. It should start at I-95 a few
miles South of the Susquehanna River bridge and run westward in an
arc toward the Monocacy River South
of Westminster. It would then turn southward East of Frederick
before crossing the Potomac River into Virginia near the
Point of Rocks bridge. From there
it should run South on the West side of Leesburg and follow the U.
S. 15 and U. S. 17 corridor southward until rejoining I- 95 South
of Fredricksburg. Entrances and
exits should be permitted only at I-83 and I-70 in Maryland and
I-66 and U. S. 17 in Virginia to prevent commuter traffic from
overloading the roadway. It would carry through interstate
traffic around the Baltimore/Washington region similar to
Interstate Highways 278 and 287 in New Jersey. These
highways are segments of an outer "Beltway" running in an arc
through central and Northern New Jersey from the Verrazano Narrows
Bridge over the Hudson River south of New York City into New York
state connecting with the Tappan Zee Bridge over the Hudson River
North of the city.
Finally, recognition should be made that there are no rest rooms
in the Metro stations or along the Beltways and major access
highways either in the Baltimore or Washington Metro areas.
With frequent hours-long delays from major traffic
accidents, weather disruptions, etc,
it is inhuman to subject travelers on the region's highways or
rail transit systems to the anguish of not having these facilities
available when they are urgently needed. Many more
highway rest areas need to be established around the Beltways and
along the region's interstate highways along with portable toilets
being placed every quarter mile elsewhere along these highways for
emergency use only during major traffic backups. Similarly,
until rest room facilities could be designed and built into the
Metro stations, portable toilet facilities such as those used at
construction sites for patron use should be placed at the ends of
the platforms in every Metro station. The Metro riders' fare cards
could be charged a dollar for each use by mounting fare card
readers or coin locks for patron access on the entrance doors of
these facilities.