Live Q&As

Here's what I wrote about the RC Parkway project on the Dr. Gridlock blog this moring:

The park service says the rehabilitation project is moving into its next phase this week, but rush hour delays for drivers will continue. Traffic will be switched from the northbound to the southbound lane on Shoreham Drive/Calvert Street and from the southbound to the northbound lane on Cathedral Avenue.

Between 7 and 9:15 a.m. weekdays, traffic will be able to enter the Shoreham Drive/Calvert Street ramp next to the Shoreham Hotel from southbound Connecticut Avenue at Calvert Street and proceed to southbound Rock Creek Parkway toward downtown Washington. The Shoreham Drive/Calvert Street ramp will be closed to southbound traffic at all other times.

At 9:30 a.m., the traffic direction will be reversed, so drivers can go northbound on the Shoreham Drive/Calvert Street ramp. That pattern will continue the rest of the day.

After 9:30 a.m., traffic will be able to go northbound only onto Cathedral Avenue, leading to Woodley Road and Connecticut Avenue. There will be no access to the Shoreham Drive/Calvert Street ramp and the Rock Creek Parkway from southbound Cathedral Avenue at any time during this phase of construction, the park service says.

The one underway now on westbound I-66, Fairfax Drive to Sycamore Street, is supposed to be done in December.

There's a lot going on at the I-66 interchange because of the HOT lanes project. Generally speaking, that work is going to continue all this year and into next.

Here's what's on VDOT's list for this week, and it's worse than ramp closings:

I-495 south at I-66: On Friday night, April 15 and Saturday night, April 16, starting at 9:30 p.m., crews will close three lanes of I-495 south at I-66. Motorists traveling on I-495 south in the Tysons Corner and I-66 areas should plan for overnight stoppages of up to one hour at a time after midnight. VDOT urges motorists familiar with the area to use alternate routes. All lanes will reopen on Saturday by 7 a.m. and on Sunday by 9 a.m.

I-495 north at I-66: Each night, Monday, April 11 through Saturday, April 16, starting at 9:30 p.m. one lane will close on I-495 north at I-66, progressing to a full I-495 north closure after 11 p.m.  Motorists will be directed to exit onto Exit 49C, I-66 west via the left exit, to Exit 62, Nutley Street and follow signage to I-66 east back to I-495 north. All lanes will reopen on weekdays by 5 a.m., on Saturday by 7 a.m. This closure allows crews to set steel beams over I-495 north.

Our previous commenter would have been glad to see any sign, even with bad grammar. But you're right, there are plenty of signs -- not just in Virginia -- that use adjectives where adverbs belong. Think of how many times you've been told to "Drive Slow."

I blame sportscasters, as in "He's hittin' good," and "He's playing outstanding."

There is a law barring cyclists from the sidewalks in downtown DC. I've never seen that on a street sign and never seen it enforced.

One break for us as pedestrians: Remember back in the 80s and 90s when you had to dodge bike messengers? Technology, rather than enforcement, took care of that.

I think cyclists need to assume that pedestrians aren't looking for them on sidewalks and do more to announce their presence.

Thanks very much for this report about the morning tragedy on Metrorail. My colleague, Justin Jouvenal, report this on the Dr. Gridlock blog:

"A woman was struck and killed by a Metro train at the Bethesda station shortly before 8 a.m., Montgomery County fire officials said.

"Riders should expect Red Line delays throughout the morning commute, according to Metro officials. [That was at 9:09 a.m.] Trains are single-tracking between the Friendship Heights and Medical Center stations.

"The woman placed herself in front of the train, according to preliminary indications, said Steven Taubenkibel, a Metro spokesman. She was struck at 7:49 a.m."

It does indeed sound like the train operator handled a very difficult situation well.

The Constitution Avenue reconstruction is scheduled to continue till early 2012. The workers will be moving block by block between 15th and 23rd streets.

This is what the park service suggests for inbound Roosevelt Bridge drivers.

Destinations north of Constitution Avenue:

Take the E Street exit north to Virginia Avenue. Merge left onto Virginia Avenue, then go right onto 19th Street southbound and make a left onto Constitution Avenue heading east.

Destinations south and east of Constitution Avenue at 14th Street:

Take the Independence Avenue exit south to Independence Avenue. Continue on Independence or turn left onto 15th Street northbound.

Here's what the park service says about getting out:

From north of Constitution Avenue and east of 14th Street:

Take 19th Street south and turn right onto E Street. Bear left for the on-ramp. Continue bearing left and follow signs for Route 50 west or I-66 west to the bridge.

From east of 14th Street:

Go west on Constitution Avenue to Virginia Avenue. Bear right onto Virginia Avenue. Turn right on 18th Street and then left onto E Street. Bear left for the on-ramp. Continue bearing left and follow signs for Route 50 west or I-66 west to the bridge.

Tom Jackman is writing a new blog called The State of NoVa, and he's got an item today called, "NoVa traffic will drive you insane."

He asked park service spokesman Bill Line about coordinating projects. He said: "The bottom line is there is never any good time amongst the 365 days of the year to do these projects. And the reality is, the work has to get done at some point.”

There are lots of road projects underway now in Virginia and the District. Seems like every construction season there are enough projects going that a driver will encounter at least one on any commute of moderate length. The agencies do talk to each other about the impacts, but if they did these projects one at a time, there would not be much improvement in the lifetime of any given commuter.

What you've seen so far is nothing. Metro has a huge plan to rebuild the Union Station entrances and exits with the goal of improving passenger flow. The staff is going to talk to Metro board members about it this Thursday. One feature of this program: Metro riders entering or exiting at Union Station will probably have to pay a surcharge to cover the cost of the work.

It's hard to remember a time when those water leaks were not a commonplace sight along the western side of the Red Line underground. Metro is doing a huge rehab project on the Red Line and that's one of the issues its supposed to deal with. The tunnel is quite far underground, and that's contributing to the problem.

If you think it's a dangerous situation, call 911 right away. (If you don't have a phone that will work underground, there's probably someone right around you who does.) You can also call the Metro transit police number, which is 202-962-2121.

We don't know all the details yet about what happened this morning. But yes, Metro is concerned about such events and has started a program that might help -- though clearly it's not a solution.

Here's a portion of what Ann Scott Tyson wrote for us last fall about the program:

Metro plans to implement a $250,000 suicide prevention program aimed at countering what officials describe as a "surge" in suicides in the system since July 2009.

The number of people committing suicide in the Metro system, mainly by jumping onto the tracks in front of trains, has roughly doubled in the past year, compared with previous years, according to Metro data.

There were five in 2008, 11 in 2009 and four this year, compared with five in 2008, said Lisa Cooper-Lucas, Metro's manager of medical services. From 2000 to 2007, there were about three or four suicides a year, she said at a meeting of a Metro board of directors committee Thursday.

The program ... would allow Metro to award a contract for a suicide prevention-training program for one year, with two additional years for completing and expanding the program, said Gary W. Baldwin, Metro's chief of human relations.

In a first phase starting in November [2010], the program would train 20 Metro employees to teach bus drivers, train operators and station managers how to spot suicidal people and stop them from taking their lives, Baldwin said.

"This is to position key members of the Metro staff, particularly frontline personnel . . . to intervene when we see those kinds of behaviors," Baldwin said. Metro employees have not had suicide prevention training yet, he said.

Metro employees would not be taught to physically restrain people contemplating or attempting suicide, but they would be instructed on how to identify and talk with them and then call on a local crisis response team if necessary.

A second phase, starting in December [2010], would aim to educate riders about the risk of suicide on the system, so that people might intervene. It makes sense to involve the public because suicides on Metro are traumatic for the entire community, Cooper-Lucas said. "It's devastating not only to the families, but the people on the platform, the station managers, the train operators and their families," she said.

Quite often, I hear from riders fed up with the trains lurching into stations. The trains, which were built to be operated automatically, have been under manual control since the Red Line crash in June 2009. Metro continues to work on the track circuit improvements that the staff says are necessary for safety before restoring automatic control. And there's no deadline for it.

I'm sure Metro is not going to partially restore the automatic controls, and I can't blame them for this policy. I don't want to ride on trains they say are like, "maybe 75 percent safe" or something like that. No experiments. Just fix it.

Your second point: Can't we just have an ordinary year when a little tinkering balances the budget? Metro doesn't seem able to come up with a financial solution big enough to last several years.

The system is designed so that the transit authority isn't in complete control of its own finances. It has to depend on the local jurisdictions for a big portion of its operating budget. Meanwhile, the board members are very sensitive to rider complaints about any proposed service cuts to safe money.

VDOT and WMATA (Metro) don't control the access road. It's the airports authority, and if the airports authority tried to open up the access road to more traffic, it would get stepped on immediately by Congress.

I don't know of anything that's exactly like your very good idea. The closest thing I can think of is the map at www.vamegaprojects.com. That's the Virginia Department of Transportation site set up to help drivers get through the very large projects in Northern Virginia. It's extremely helpful in that regard, but doesn't deal with a commute that might take you from I-66 over the Roosevelt Bridge and onto Constitution Avenue, for example.

Good to hear about the train operator's response to a very bad situation.

By the end of the year, DC should have completed the two new highway spans for the 11th Street Bridge, creating a seamless highway connection across the District for drivers.

I think that one is in the out years of DC's 10 year plan for adding Circulator routes.