Washington Post gallery of rainstorm pictures
Article about the rainstorm's effect on traffic
. . . as I was driven to work today down Route 29 after my Z9 Express to Silver Spring (from which I then transfer to another bus headed to Bethesda) failed to show up. The radio said it was blocked by mud in the vicinity of New Hampshire Avenue. I couldn't believe it, but there it was: the road was covered in mud in Burnt Mills. Not the first time this has happened, but the first time I've seen the traffic this bad on the Pike, and we've lived out here for over seven years - about when the traffic started getting bad, people say.
Why is Route 29 the only road across the Northwest Branch? A "Route 29 spur" was proposed as part of the County's Master Plan for roads that would have connected University Boulevard to 29 north of Lockwood Drive, bypassing Four Corners and the Burnt Mills Dam. Of course, this was forty years ago. The Right-Of-Way probably no longer exists - but, boy, would it have saved a lot of trouble this morning.
1 comment:
A portion of the right-of-way (which I believe it is now county parkland) can still be seen near Northwood High School whose main entrance actually faces the former paper street instead of University Blvd. I think this road would devastate one of the most beautiful stream valleys in the region but I hope the same right-of-way will be used one day to build an Outer Purple Line from Tysons Corner to Konterra via White Oak.
Instead, they should just build a much bigger bridge at Burnt Mills. The Northwest Branch hiker trail actually has an underpass at the existing bridge despite its extraordinarily low clearance. I also wish I had a photo of the Burnt Mills Dam in flood condition.
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