State BRAC plan doesn’t address our traffic problems, says Leggett
Janet M December 7th, 2007
The Baltimore Sun reported last week on County Executive Ike Leggett’s letter to Gov. Martin O’Malley, in which he stressed that the state’s draft action plan — due to be released this month — doesn’t sufficiently address the anticipated traffic congestion around the future Walter Reed National Military Medical Center.
…the Draft BRAC Action Plan does not identify specific and concrete mitigations for anticipated major traffic congestion that will have significant ramifications for accessibility to NNMC/WRNMMC, the National Institutes of Health, Suburban Hospital…and on the quality of life of surrounding well-established neighborhoods.
This letter was in direct response to the concerns expressed to Leggett by the BRAC Implementation Committee (BIC) in a letter dated November 29th, in which BIC Chairman John Carman urged Leggett to communicate the advisory group’s concerns about the state action plan and its omissions to the governor:
…We must not lose sight [that] this particular BRAC action is about…making the new WRNMMC the world-class hospital for our nation’s greatest heroes…soldiers with severe wounds, as well as retired military personnel, will be seeking treatment and care for years to come at the newly-designated WRNMMC in Bethesda. If the State of Maryland cannot provide adequate infrastructure to allow for safe and effective access to and egress from the campus, and the movement of vehicular and pedestrian traffic in the surrounding area, it will have a devastating effect on the region’s grown, prosperity, emergency preparedness and livability.
Leggett also wrote a recent opinion piece in the Gazette in which he stressed the need for infrastructure upgrades to handle the estimated 2500 cars per day that will be driving into the Medical Center campus.
PDF copies of all the letters can be found on the Coalition of MMC Neighbors web site (login required) under Files.
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