County Council member Roger Berliner said he and other community members will take to River Road and Massachusetts Avenue next week in a “day of action” meant to get the attention of drivers and the State Highway Administration (SHA).
At 7 a.m. on Nov. 3, Berliner and others participating in the event will be at the Little Falls Library on Massachusetts Avenue holding signs asking drivers to pay more attention to the road.
The library is located near the spot where Tim Holden, a Bethesda resident and retired Navy SEAL, was killed while riding his bicycle on Aug. 28. Ricardo Freeman, the driver of the car involved in the collision, has yet to be charged and police haven’t released details as to who they believe was at fault.
Two local neighborhood groups—the Glen Mar Park Association and Mohican Hills Citizens Association—backed a resolution asking the SHA to implement traffic-calming measures on a section of Massachusetts Avenue where they say drivers often speed and fail to yield to pedestrians in crosswalks.
Berliner, who in a press release announcing the event said “we need the state to be a partner” in promoting pedestrian and bicyclist safety, invited Maryland Transportation Secretary Pete Rahn to take part.
At 8 a.m., Berliner and the group will move to the corner of River Road and Springfield Drive, where 95-year-old Bethesda resident Marge Wydro was killed last week while crossing the street to her weekly bowling league at Kenwood Country Club.
“In the wake of these two tragedies, residents have been asking, ‘What can we do now?’ And my answer in this moment is this: We have to mobilize. We have to show the State how important getting these two roads right is for our community,” said Berliner, who represents the Bethesda area and chairs the council’s Transportation Committee.
Berliner’s staff says distracted driving is responsible for 80 percent of crashes in Montgomery County and he praised county police for a series of distracted driving stings on River Road, not far from the site of Wydro’s death.
The driver involved in Wydro’s death has not been charged and detectives are continuing to investigate the incident.
The event will focus on getting lower speed limits and changing other design elements of the two roads, both of which SHA has authority over.
"The loss of even one life as a result of a pedestrian or auto accident along River Road is unacceptable and we have to show the State Highway Administration how we feel," said Phyllis Edelman, president of the Springfield Civic Association. "The SHA appears more concerned with following old-school engineering guidelines than the safety of our community members."
State legislators from District 16 are also expected to attend the event.
Despite Wydro’s death last Wednesday night, and the death of an 18-year-old woman crossing Route 29 in Silver Spring only 12 hours later, county officials say total pedestrian collisions and severe pedestrian collisions decreased in 2014 compared to 2013.
Statistics for pedestrian collisions this year weren’t immediately available.
