Save The Trail Coalition

Testimony -- December 10, 2009

before the Montgomery County Planning Board

Testimony of Bonnie Naradzay, Silver Spring

Member of Carroll Knolls/McKenney Hills Citizens’ Association

Have you ridden your bicycle or walked or run from Silver Spring along the Capital Crescent Trail to Bethesda and then on down to Washington DC and back again?  If not, please do so before you embrace the significantly altered Functional Plan before you tonight. 

It bears no relation to the Master Plan, which included an artist’s single sketch of a one- track train system powered with an overhead electric rail that would have run between Silver Spring and Bethesda.   Now it would have us believe that there’s room for a double track light rail system with 200’ long trains passing every three minutes in opposite directions.  If you actually look at the available space on the trail, you’d see there’s not the width necessary for a double track side-by-side system, and there’d be absolutely no room for bike riders or casual commuters on foot, even going single-file.  The stations in the altered Functional Plan were absolutely not designed with thru-bike riders and hikers in mind.  Only private developers, some of whom are in this room tonight, will gain from such an unfeasible concept.  As a matter of plain integrity, and sound public policy, please vote it down. 

I've lived in Silver Spring for over thirty years near the intersection of Forest Glen and Georgia Avenue.  For untold years, I've biked to Bethesda as well as commuted to downtown Washington DC to my job by using the Capital Crescent Trail's important link between Silver Spring and Bethesda.  It’s a busy two-way trail, protected from traffic, shielded by mature stands of  trees, and used during all seasons by bike riders, commuters, hikers, parents with babies in strollers.

This trail is important to tens of thousands of multigenerational Trail users, and it’s vitally important to me; it's part of the reason I live in lower Montgomery County, which tends to get the short end of the stick whenever park and planning’s involved.   When my two children were growing up, they rode this trail with me as well.  My daughter, who works in downtown Washington DC, bikes the Trail to get to work..  This trail that links Silver Spring to downtown Bethesda is a precious heritage and a legacy.  Double tracking the Purple Line will destroy this legacy.  It will require clear cutting all trees and running trains a few feet away from a narrow (unpassable, dangerous), shadeless, sidewalk -- not a nature Trail for all seasons with room for people to go in two directions.   Help us preserve this beautiful, protected natural corridor, and along with it, our diminishing quality of life. 

The Park and Planning Commission has a responsibility to prioritize preservation of green space for its citizenry.  Moreover, the downcounty area is particularly vulnerable to developers’ encroachments and haphazard, predatory development.  Please protect lower Montgomery County from further ravaging and fraudulent plans that ignore our basic environmental protections and rights.  Thank you for deliberating before you destroy our Capital Crescent Trail.  I am grateful for this opportunity to plead my case before you, our unelected Planning Board. 

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