we need to fight for the met. branch trail!

if you get scott roberts' daily bloomingdalian email, you knew that there were a TON of community events tonight, from a PSA meeting, to a schools meeting at emery, to the metropolitan branch trail meeting at big bear (as well as star wars), and wine tastings at timor. if you want to go to everything in the neighborhood, you're stuck. too much to do around here. why can't bloomingdale be dull and boring, eh? :)

seriously though, a lot was going on tonight, and it would have been fun to drop by a couple other things, but i was busy, so i could only hit the met. branch trail meeting before i had to go off to a casey trees meeting at their downtown HQ.

here's the deal with the bike trail -- things are ready to move forward, but there's a roadblock that's keeping us from getting this trail extended up in to the neighborhood. that roadblock is pepco. basically, ddot has a contractor selected to pave the trail, but there is a small amount of right away from just north of new york ave. to R street that pepco is dragging their feet on (see this map for an approximation of where the issue is). ddot can't officially let the contract for the trail without money from the federal highway administration (don't ask me why they're involved), and the FHWA won't give the money until ddot has ownership of the right-of-way. ddot won't have the right-of-way until pepco and their lawyers get on the ball and draw up the necessary papers to deed things over to the city.

it's been sitting like this for ages. i asked the ddot representatives at the meeting how we, as interested citizens, can help push things forward. the ddot folks were knowledgeable, but they don't have an answer to that question yet. they did say they would let us know what to do as soon as they do. basically, it looks to me like we need to have the mayor, councilman thomas, and delegate holmes-norton (who had a representative at the meeting) to ride pepco and let them know that they're mucking this whole thing up. i'm sure the right applied pressure could get them on the ball here.

email fenty's office and thomas' office and let them know you want them to act on this. i know that the ddot people are doing their best, but i've learned that, in dc, the only way to get things done is to get someone who's at the top of the ladder to intervene. we need to raise a stink so our leaders realize we actually want this trail. get on it, people!