Several dozen trees could be razed to make way for a new sidewalk on Wisconsin Avenue, in Bethesda, though an agreement between the State Highway Administration and the Chevy Chase Club would allow some trees to be replaced after construction is complete.
After months of negotiation, the club agreed to donate one foot of its property fronting the portion of Wisconsin Avenue along which the sidewalk is slated to be built, said SHA spokesman Charlie Gischlar. SHA would build the sidewalk.
The project would create a 0.7-mile-long shared-use path on the northbound side of Wisconsin Avenue, between Grafton Street and Bradley Lane, that would accommodate pedestrians, cyclists and bus users. An updated design should be complete by late fall, SHA spokesman David Buck wrote in an e-mail.
Building the sidewalk would necessitate the loss of 53 trees, five of which are dying and slated to be removed, Buck wrote. All trees lost on Chevy Chase Club property would be replaced, he added.
SHA has said it would replant one tree for every tree cut down, either on or near the project. Some trees also will be preserved by limiting the 8-foot sidewalk to 6 feet in some places, Gischlar said.
The sidewalk has been requested by local communities, including the Chevy Chase West Neighborhood Association, to facilitate safer pedestrian access on Wisconsin Avenue. The project has generated controversy because it would lead to the removal of trees along a stretch of road informally known as the ‘Green Mile.’
“This is a small sidewalk that will make Bethesda-Chevy Chase and Friendship Heights a better place to live and an easier place to live without a car,” said Michael Replogle, co-chair of the Chevy Chase West Neighborhood Association’s Transportation Committee and a former transportation coordinator for the Montgomery County Planning Department.
Most trees affected by the project are relatively small, and their loss would not have a negative impact on water quality, he said.
In return for the club’s land donation, SHA will replace the existing fence with an aesthetically pleasing 8-foot tall fence that still is in design, Gischlar wrote. Officials of the club could not be reached for comment.
The sidewalk project is backed by officials of the Chevy Chase West Neighborhood Association and Chevy Chase Village, though they have expressed concern about the loss of trees.
An alternative plan by the Little Falls Watershed Alliance, an environmental group that opposes the project due to tree loss, would preserve all but three trees.
The plan calls for a short sidewalk south of the Chevy Chase Club between Hesketh and Grafton streets, upgrades to bus stops between Bradley and Grafton, and improvements to an existing sidewalk on the other side of Wisconsin Avenue, said Dan Dozier, co-president of the alliance.
SHA officials think that plan is not viable because one of the project’s primary objectives is to provide a continuous shared-use path on the northbound side of Wisconsin Avenue, Buck wrote.
The alliance’s alternative is more environmentally sensitive, and would provide safer bus stops on Wisconsin Avenue, Dozier said.
“The only reason to get off the bus there is to go across Wisconsin Avenue at a place where there are no lights and no crosswalks,” he said. “For any handicapped person, that’s crazy.”
The plan is opposed by Montgomery Bicycle Advocates because it eliminates bicycle access on that side of Wisconsin Avenue, said Jack Cochrane, chair of MoBike. MoBike has no formal membership, but has 200 people on its listserv.
Cochrane said the segment of new sidewalk proposed by the alliance is an important segment for pedestrian access, but the project is “not just a pedestrian project.”
The southernmost 500 feet of the sidewalk proposed by SHA is adjacent to private homes and would be 5 feet wide, he said.
Five feet is unsafe for novice cyclists who risk falling from the sidewalk into traffic, Cochrane said. MoBike will request that the county approach homeowners south of the Chevy Chase Club to obtain additional land, he said.
“We urge the county to ask these property owners to provide land or an easement that would allow construction of the path further from the street in return for monetary compensation of some sort,” he said. “To my knowledge no one has asked them for this.”
For more stories from Montgomery County, go to gazette.net .
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