Officials from Montgomery Parks thought it was a simple enough proposal: Build an exit road from the Rockwood Manor Estate so fire truck and ambulance drivers wouldn’t have to struggle with the park’s narrow and only access point.
But for much of 2014—leading up to a January 2015 community meeting unveiling the project—Parks officials have contended with neighboring residents who complained about late-night noise from events on the property, idling buses sending fumes to their front doorsteps and a proposed exit road that would create so much traffic as to trap them in their neighborhood.
While changes to music and bus rules at the 30-acre park on MacArthur Boulevard in Potomac seem to have solved those issues, many in the adjacent Woodrock neighborhood continue to fight the idea for the new exit road—which would connect to Belfast Road, the same street homeowners use to get to and from MacArthur Boulevard.
“The Association is vehemently opposed to these proposed changes, all of which would negatively impact the Association’s residents as the expected result would be to increase the traffic within the Association,” wrote Woodrock Homeowners Association President Gary Miller in an April letter to Planning Board Chairman Casey Anderson,
Three residents of the neighborhood have hired a lawyer, former lead Planning Board attorney Michele Rosenfeld, to represent them when the project goes before the Planning Board July 30.
The West Montgomery County Citizens Association also opposes the exit road, claiming it would be “a clear impingement” on the neighborhood of 215 homes.
The dispute is the latest in a long history of controversy surrounding the site, which Montgomery Parks began operating as a venue for weddings, business retreats, scouting troops and school groups in 1983.
Rockwood Manor was developed in the 1920s as the country estate of Washington, D.C., socialite Carolyn Gangwer Caughey, who in her will donated the site to the Girl Scouts of America in 1936, according to Montgomery Parks.
It was operated as the Rockwood Girl Scout National Center until 1978, when the Girl Scouts of America tried to sell the property to local developers.
A number of local Girl Scout troops and citizens associations contested the sale in a lawsuit, claiming it violated the terms of Caughey’s will. An out-of-court settlement resulted in the sale of about 60 of the property’s original 93 acres to home developers.
The remaining 30 acres, including the manor house and surrounding buildings, were given to the county’s park system for use as a public park.
The parks department soon began renting out the site for events, much in the same fashion it does today.
In 2009, an unsolicited proposal to turn it into a bed-and-breakfast, restaurant and "wildlife rehabilitation center" to be called the National Outdoor Center was panned by many in the community.
The opposition was so strong that Park Police had to be on hand during public meetings to keep order, according to Montgomery Parks staff.
According to a December 2009 story in The Gazette, Sunny Pitcher, founder of the Potomac Paddlesports kayaking school, withdrew the proposal because of the opposition. The parks department was reportedly willing to explore the idea in part because the Rockwood Manor facility had lost $75,000 in 2008.
It appears the facility is doing better financially. Montgomery Parks says spring, summer and fall weekend bookings “tend to” fill up 18 months in advance and there are typically two or three corporate events at the site each week.
But Parks staff said that an incident two years ago in one of Rockwood Manor’s parking lots alerted them to issues with the property’s small entrance and exit road off MacArthur Boulevard.
In the January community meeting, Parks staff said a man killed himself in the parking lot. A firetruck couldn’t travel the oddly angled and narrow access road, so rescue workers had no choice but to sprint into the park from MacArthur Boulevard.
To figure out how to fix the problem, staff conducted a $60,000 feasibility study that found the best solution would be to make the access road one-way in and build a one-way out exit road to connect to Belfast Road.
The existing Rockwood Manor site (left) and the planned alignment of a portion of newly-built road (right) that would allow visitors to exit onto Belfast Road, via Montgomery Parks.
Many community members objected to the idea in the January meeting, but Parks landscape architect Aaron Feldman maintained that widening the existing access road was not an option because of mature trees that would have to be cut down or impacted.
Before moving forward with the estimated $650,000 project to build the exit road and consolidate the property’s 85 parking spots into one lot, Parks staff will present it July 30 to the Planning Board because of the controversy.
To address residents’ concerns about traffic getting out of their neighborhood after events at the property, Parks staff had a traffic engineering consultant set up time-stamped, motion-activated cameras at Rockwood Manor’s existing exit and along Belfast Road to count the numbers of cars on both roads.
According to Montgomery Parks, the cameras were set up for one week in May and measured how three events at the venue impacted traffic in half-hour increments.
“For the most part, there was little overlap between vehicles leaving Rockwood Manor and westbound vehicles leaving the neighborhood on Belfast Road,” Parks staff wrote in a report. “The traffic exiting large events from Rockwood Manor tended to be dispersed over several hours, rather than in a concentrated flow.”
The cameras found the combined amount of vehicles using both roads was usually less than 10 “and only once more than 20” within any one half-hour period.
It’s unclear if that information will appease those who oppose the project.
“To our knowledge, Parks has already failed to take into account the unique qualities of the geography when it comes to noise and the community has made legitimate complaints,” Ginny Barnes, environmental chairman of the West Montgomery County Citizens Association, wrote in a July 4 email to Parks staff. “When built, much effort went into tucking the 200+ homes into the rolling terrain amidst the forest, thus keeping them from having an adverse impact on the bucolic nature of Rockwood Manor. We believe Parks owes the community the same consideration.”
Not every resident in the Woodrock neighborhood is in agreement.
“Very few Woodrock residents will be leaving the neighborhood on Belfast [Road] late at night when most Rockwood Manor functions will be over and people will be leaving,” resident George Daves wrote in an email to Parks staff after the January meeting. “I was surprised at some of the hysteria exhibited by my neighbors but I’ve been to many zoning and permit hearings [where] people just don’t think.”
Proposed new layout for Rockwood Manor, which would include new exit to Belfast Road and consolidated guest parking, via Montgomery Parks.
