Posted on 07/08/2018 1:11:29 AM PDT by Tolerance Sucks Rocks
Maryland’s $9 billion plan to expand the Beltway and Interstate 270 is among the nation’s biggest boondoggles, a public-interest advocacy group said Tuesday in a new report.
The report — issued by U.S. PIRG Education Fund and Frontier Group — highlights nine highway projects, including Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan’s plan to widen certain roadways using public-private partnerships and tolling to pay for them.
The advocates say these projects are unwise for several reasons. They say expanding or building new highways always leads to more congestion over time through the wholly predictable phenomenon of “induced demand”: When new capacity opens up, more commuters and cars — not to mention housing developers and businesses — begin to use the highway until congestion returns. They say building new lanes is also irresponsible when the nation is facing an enormous backlog of needed repairs on existing roads, bridges and other infrastructure — not to mention mass transit systems, such as Baltimore’s and Washington’s. The report advocates a “fix-it-first” policy.
The report also argues that even with public-private financing, states such as Maryland will probably incur additional debt to expand highways, given the stagnant revenue coming from the gas tax. And it makes the case that building more highways is the wrong move when the United States should be promoting alternative ways of getting around that do not rip up neighborhoods and landscapes and dump more pollutants into the air.
The latest report comes as Hogan (R) said the U.S. Interior Department has agreed to evaluate the transfer of part of the Baltimore-Washington Parkway, which would also be expanded as part of Hogan’s traffic plan. The plan, unveiled in September, would rely on public-private partnerships — and thus tolls — for at least part of its funding.
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonpost.com ...
If the powers that be want to spend more money on highways, they should create more ways to cross 495 and 270. The beltway is an artificial river that channelizes traffic onto the too-few crossing points.
The fact remains that there are now ten million people living in the region. People need to live closer to their jobs. This is happening. Gentrifiers are transforming DC. The edge cities are trying to build real downtowns. The long distance car commuters are living in the past.
“induced demand”
Sure, just because someone added a lane, I’m going to go out of my way to use that road. I live on the east coast, but when LA added lanes to I-5, I started taking that on my daily commute. Many of my neighbors decided to take jobs and move out there for use of that new lane.
This has always been an absurd argument.
In case you haven’t noticed, population has been generally increasing. You need more road to handle more cars. The concept is known as “throughput”.
If their argument were correct, you could reduce demand by reducing all roads to one lane.
I 70 should be 3 lanes from Hagerstown to get to I 270.
That surprises me. Of course, I left PG about 15 years ago, so I am behind the 8-ball as to the changes you are witnessing. But one of my 1st jobs was collecting loan payments for a finance company. Spent more that a few days in Anacostia. Dangerous place.
What about Camp Barry? And Stanton Road? Where are the natives being relocated; deeper into PG?
I'm not saying that these neighborhoods are now good, just that they are vastly better than they used to be and are improving rapidly. The whole Anacostia River corridor is going to be open, accessible, walkable, bikeable, and full of parks and playgrounds. Residential Anacostia will be dragged along for the ride. Capitol Hill pressure will jump the river. The National Harbor hub is growing. DHS has created a major presence on the old St. E's campus. The bad areas of Anacostia will steadily shrink as the reclaimed areas spread and link up. This is going to be a hot real estate area over the next 20 years.
I don't know where the displaced underclass is going. Baltimore, I suppose, where they will fit right in.
I’d settle for 70 being three lanes from Urbana to Frederick. Frederick to Hagerstown isn’t too bad, unless some idiot that’s texting misses a curve and goes off the road.
Frederick is not seeing nearly the growth that’s happening in Clarksburg and Urbana. Just exploding there.
They can keep it.
270. Not 70 :)
Good article here. I think anyone that lives in a municipality that espouses “planned gridlock” should be charged a “planned gridlock” fee on top of any shipping fee when receiving a delivery. This would help reimburse the carrier for sitting for hours in traffic due to the municipality diverting road funding for mass transit.
https://www.mcgop.com/planned_gridlock_or_traffic_relief
Thank you. I love before and after stuff, but have absolutely zero desire to revisit these old haunts just to see the changes.
Some new pavement is needed, but it needs to be both strategic and placed with a minimum of expectation for solving the congestion. 270 should be three lanes in each direction all the way to 70, the interchange in Frederic where 70, 270 and 15 meet needs to be rethought (there is no obvious fix to that mess). The bridge for 270 over MD 85 is functionally obsolete for both roads. MD 97 (Georgia Ave) should be two lanes in each direction from Olney all the way to Westminster. Build the Brookville Bypass. That said I believe that more than three lanes in each direction is past the point of marginal gain for cost in increasing traffic flow.
While I think expanding service on the MARC Brunswick line would help, significant increase in service would require adding track to the current double track main line to prevent interference with freight movements. I doubt that triple tracking from Point of Rocks to Silver Spring is going to be that different from adding two lanes to the entire length of 270 from a cost or time point of view.
Extending the Red line from Glenmont station to the ICC along (or under) Georgia Ave should also be considered.
Unfortunately the only thing that would truly reduce congestion in the DC area would be to shrink the Fed Gov significantly.
It is actually probably faster to take the MARC train from Frederick to Union Station than to drive to capital hill during Rush Hour. Which is part of the reason I advocate expanding the service on the Brunswick line. Unfortunately CSX owns the tracks and impacting their ability to move freight is a non-starter. Thus I advocate starting by building 3 mile long station siding where space permits and going to full triple track on that mainline, basically two CSX track and one MARC track (send Amtrak on the MARC tracks).
You nailed it, I absolutely agree but we will never see it happening.
The politicos in the surrounding D.C. counties are all part of the D.C. swamp. Money is flowing out of D.C. to here and they will fight for it.
I'd like to see that. Move all government agencies back to the states, and the same for Congress. Keep our Congresscritters home, so they interact with real people and see the damage that our bloated FedGov is doing. Let them meet by teleconference instead of in the fake wealthy world of DC.
If only the issue was commuters coming to and fro from DC. Reality is two income families have spouses often working in opposite ends of the DMV and living somewhere in the middle, which is usually an affordable Maryland suburb. The employment highway runs from Northern Virginia all the way to the outskirts of Frederick, east to the BWI Business corridor.
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