The McComas Avenue Neighborhood Greenway project aims to improve pedestrian and bicyclist safety on McComas Avenue near Wheaton Mall. The project limit is from St. Paul Street to Georgia Avenue, including portions of Douglas Avenue and Windham Lane.
Neighborhood Greenways are streets with low motorized traffic volumes and speeds, designed and designated to give walking and bicycling priority. McComas Avenue was designated a Neighborhood Greenway by the 2018 Montgomery County Bicycle Master Plan . Neighborhood Greenways use signs, pavement markings, and speed and volume management measures to calm traffic and discourage through trips by motor vehicles to create safe, convenient use of streets by pedestrians and cyclists. Design elements can include traffic diverters at key intersections, traffic circles or mini-roundabouts, traffic calming, shared lane markings, crossing improvements, and wayfinding signage to guide bicyclists along the route and to key destinations. More information about the different types of improvements can be found here .
Based on recurring feedback from the community, the project team is expanding the McComas Avenue Neighborhood Greenway project limits beyond Georgia Avenue to connect with the future Amherst Avenue Bikeway.
The project limits (from St. Paul Street to 150’ west of the intersection with Georgia Avenue on McComas Avenue/Windham Lane and Drumm Avenue from McComas Avenue to University Boulevard) will remain the same for Phase 1. Phase 2 will focus on extending the Neighborhood Greenway on McComas Avenue/Windham Lane through Georgia Avenue to the future Amherst Avenue Bikeway.
The project team is progressing towards completing 100% of the design for Phase 1, with the final design anticipated by the end of 2024. As impacts are expected on the school property at Stephen Knolls School, the project team is also coordinating with MCPS’s real estate team to acquire a temporary construction easement. Construction will begin once the easement is established, which is estimated for early 2025, weather permitting.
MCDOT is currently working on the detailed project scopes for the Phase 2 portion, which is expected to kick off in late fall 2024.
The McComas Avenue Neighborhood Greenway project has reached the 70% design milestone. MCDOT invites you to review the latest design and share your comments through May 20, 2024.
Check out the 70% design of the project in the following interactive web application, which allows users to zoom in and out to look at this project closely. You can directly share your comments with us on this web application. Alternatively, you can email the project manager at [email protected] .
In addition, detailed engineering plans are available on the project website under the Project Documents tab. Feel free to download the file and review the latest design.
On Thursday, September 14, 2023, the Montgomery County Planning Board will be briefed on this project. The meeting is open to the public. Interested community members and the public are encouraged to listen in and provide written and/or oral testimonies regarding this project. For more information, please visit https://montgomeryplanningboard.org/agendas/ .
Public input is key to the success of a capital improvement project, as it helps us better understand the community's needs and concerns. Your input is important to us! Though we welcome the public to provide comments and feedback at any point throughout this project, we would greatly appreciate receiving your comments by May 19, 2023.
Please submit your comments via the following methods:
November 2022 Updates
MCDOT seeks public input throughout the project to better serve the community's needs. MCDOT is conducting a community survey to assess the specifics of improving pedestrian safety on Upton Drive. The results will be used to guide the direction of this study, such as current concerns related to roadway safety, ideas for improvements, and community pedestrian and bicyclist needs.
A Neighborhood Greenway is a street where the safe movement of bicyclists and pedestrians is prioritized, and the fast, through movement of vehicles is minimized. This is achieved by using different treatments to slow down drivers or discourage them from using the street. Tools can include speed treatments such as speed humps and diversionary treatments.
Speed treatments are traffic calming tools added to the street that encourage motorists to drive more slowly. They can include things like "chokers" that make the road narrower, "chicanes" that introduce a weave to the roadway, and “mini-roundabouts” that require drivers to move through intersections more slowly. These are just a few examples:
Access management refers to treatments installed to reduce drivers’ ability to move through the network. Treatments can include making a street one-way at the end of a block, installing a median so that drivers can only turn right at an intersection, or full closures for portions of the street. Other tools are available. This is only a sample of treatments
Angel Cheng, Project Engineer MCDOT Division of Transportation Engineering 100 Edison Park Drive, 4th Floor SE Gaithersburg, Maryland 20878 Phone: 240-777-7274 E-mail: [email protected]