Where the 'Rustic' Clogs the Road
Montgomery Rules Make It Tough for Farmers to Maneuver

By Nancy Trejos
Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, April 24, 2006

To commuters, River Road is the clogged thoroughfare that snakes between the District and Montgomery County, lined with its share of strip malls and fast-food restaurants.

Forty miles northwest of downtown Washington, in the town of Dickerson, it's something very different: an unpaved, dusty, one-lane road.

Built in the early 19th century, River Road is one of 106 county-designated "rustic" roads or stretches of road in Montgomery, most of them in the 93,000-acre agricultural reserve.

They are the endangered species of roads in a region where four-lane highways are considered skimpy. "We're trying to maintain some sort of physical reference, visual reference, to try to keep the county's heritage intact," said Mike Seebold, a preservationist and appointee to the county's eight-member advisory committee on rustic roads. "Those are the visions that you need to pass on to different generations."

But those visions -- low-hanging canopies of trees, sharp curves, a narrow average road width of 16 1/2 feet -- have become inconveniences to the people for whom the roads were made: farmers.

With traditional farming less profitable, many farmers are using larger tractors and combines, some as wide as 15 feet, to plant on more land. Their machines, they say, are getting too large for the roads, which are kept as close to their original condition as possible. Compounding the problem is that farmers are increasingly sharing the roads with commuters looking to find alternatives to clogged highways.

More and more, farmers are losing their patience with the inspiration behind John Denver's hit "Take Me Home, Country Roads," co-written by Denver and District native Bill Danoff and his then-wife Taffy Nivert, as the couple drove through northwestern Montgomery to West Virginia.

"It's fine for somebody who is a weekend warrior, but someone who has to use it every day to make a living is a different proposition," said David Scott, owner of Oakridge Farm in Dickerson.

As planting season begins, many farmers say the county's preservation efforts are betraying the original intent of the agricultural reserve by making it harder for them to move their equipment from field to field.

Most rustic roads lack shoulders, curbs, sidewalks or pavement. Widening is, for the most part, prohibited. Canopies of trees are rarely trimmed, partly because of confusion over who is responsible for the work -- the county or the property owner. Maintenance is done as needed for safety but must not destroy the road's character.

"I think there's an inclination to do less, just because by doing less there's a perception that it is more in keeping with the rural character," said County Council member Michael Knapp (D-Upcounty).

This month, the council voted to create a working group that will study various issues involving the agricultural reserve, including the condition of roads and the ban of alternative water and sewer technology that facilitates development.

The farmers say they want the county to spend more to fix and maintain the roads, including trimming the tree canopies, and to build shoulders in certain places.

Preservationists counter that the goal of the county's nationally renowned agricultural reserve, where only one home can be built per 25 acres, is not just to protect those who own and manage the 577 farms but to maintain open space as development swallows up land.

"The entire county are stakeholders when it comes to the agricultural reserve," said Dolores G. Milmoe, an official with the Audubon Naturalist Society, which opposes suburban sprawl in the reserve. "It's not just the landowners up there, but people all over the county recognize it's wonderful to know we have these rural lands so close to a metropolitan area."

They are people such as Ben Holmes, who lives near the reserve in Laytonsville. The conditions, he said, weren't a problem before and shouldn't be a problem now. "Farmers have been driving up and down those roads for years," he said.

Preservationists and county officials dispute suggestions that the program makes it difficult for farmers to earn a living. "It's not the intent of the program to impede their activity on the roads at all," said Laura Van Etten, who chairs the rustic roads advisory committee.

At a time when it's increasingly difficult for those working small farms to earn a profit, farmers say they are spending hundreds of thousands of dollars on larger, more efficient machines. Busted mirrors and windshields are common because of the tree canopies, they say.

Keith Patton Sr., co-owner of JT Patton and Sons Turf Farms in Dickerson, stores an unused 1948 tractor that is about six feet wide and has 20 horsepower to pull an eight-foot drill. On his field, he's got tractors as wide as 13 feet that have 200 horsepower and pull 30-foot drills.

"The face of farming has changed," he said. "You can't farm with a horse and buggy like you did when the roads were built."

Although the county does not keep traffic volume data specifically for rustic roads, several farmers said they have seen traffic increase. They avoid driving their vehicles during rush hour and work more on weekends for fear of collisions or road rage.

County spokeswoman Esther Bowring could not provide an overall picture of the safety record of rustic roads because, she said, the police department does not categorize accident data that way.

But police were able to tally the number of collisions reported last year for four roads -- Montevideo Road; River Road between Edwards Ferry Road and Whites Ferry Road; West Willard Road; and Whites Ferry Road between Wasche Road and River Road. The total, 20, was not much different than in years past.

"We have always sought to strike an appropriate balance between the rural and urban areas of our community, preserving our past while keeping our economy strong," Bowring said.

But, Knapp said, "it's sort of a Catch-22. You want to preserve the rural character of the reserve, and part of that is preserving agriculture. But by preserving the rural character, you inhibit the ability to do agriculture."

One recent sunny afternoon, farmer Billy Willard kept the headlights of his white Chevrolet Suburban on as it snaked through West Willard Road to warn approaching sedans and SUVs of what was behind him: a 32-foot-wide John Deere corn planter driven by his farm manager at 22 mph. With parts folded, it was about 15 feet wide and covered both sides of the road.

The Poolesville road was named for Willard's family, whose farm has been producing grain, corn and wheat since Willard's great-great-grandfather Dewalt J. Willard bought the property in 1871. Established between 1865 and 1879, West Willard Road is paved but narrow and hilly, with dense trees on each side.

The planter pulled out of the driveway and encountered a UPS truck going in the opposite direction. With no shoulder to retreat to, the planter and the truck stopped. The truck was the first to budge, pulling over into the grass.

Not far down the road, Willard approached a sharp curve with trees that limited his visibility. He waved and flashed his lights at a small sedan. The car sped by.

"I don't think people are malicious," Willard said. "I think they're ignorant on what we're doing."

The county created the rustic roads program in the late 1980s after residents complained about efforts to widen two one-lane bridges and pave a road, said Glenn Orlin, the council's deputy staff director, who was on a task force that studied the issue.

"The idea is to leave this alone. It's too precious as an aesthetic resource," Orlin said.

Mason Hopkins, who farms in Dickerson, said the county needs to balance aesthetics with practicality. "We're not asking for a four-lane highway," he said. "But a two-foot paved shoulder alongside what we have now? That would go a long way."

To preservationists, it's a slippery slope.

"If you widen every [rustic] road to 31 feet and put shoulders on them," Seebold said, "then suddenly it's like every road."