Langley HS PTSA Survey Results on VDOT's Proposed I-495 NB Ramp Closure

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Thanks for sharing. Just once, it would be nice to see Langley families speak up for something that wasn't in their own interests or for someone other than themselves.

We're very glad we decided to buy in a different school district.

Hilarious. So Langley families are supposed to just grin and bear it as MD drivers utilize the roads that WE pay taxes on? When there is a perfectly good toll road for them to use, but which they *choose* to avoid? Sorry, I'm not at all interested in making life easier for MD drivers, who pay nothing in VA taxes yet still think nothing of clogging up our neighborhood roads when there is a viable alternative.

I'm very glad you decided to buy in a different school district as well.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Possibly closing an off ramp because it makes it difficult for kids to get to extracurricular? Really? There are a number of inside the beltway schools that have traffic issues - should we just start closing roads to benefit school traffic? What am I missing?

I live on the McLean High School side of McLean. We are seeing enormous traffic on Westmoreland and Great Falls streets between the hours of 5 and 6. Backups are roughly one mile. Commuters trying to avoid the 66 tolls are using our surface streets and Waze is routing people through neighborhoods. It's become very frustrating, not to mention dangerous when people are driving WELL above posted speed limits to try and cut a minute off their commute.

So, to answer your question, yes, I would imagine that these backups are causing people to miss extracurricular activities. Maybe even adding 20+ minutes to getting kids there.

The larger issue is that we need to slow down the volume of traffic using neighborhood streets and smaller surface roads. How we do that, I'm not sure. But the volume of traffic using McLean as an alternative to the Beltway and 66 has clearly become an issue.

+1

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Possibly closing an off ramp because it makes it difficult for kids to get to extracurricular? Really? There are a number of inside the beltway schools that have traffic issues - should we just start closing roads to benefit school traffic? What am I missing?

Why does Langley high school convenience get to dictate access and ramp closures on a major highway?

This is completely unreasonable.

I bet if it were any other high school, you'd be fine with it. Just the fact that it's Langley means you are outraged.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Another data point exemplifying why I am so grateful we spent extra money to live in a walkable neighborhood.

I can't even imagine the daily hell of having to involve the beltway in our child getting to school - what an awful way to live.

The issue isn't using the beltway to get our kids to school. It's trying to use our local roads and finding them backed up due to MD drivers using them as access to the Beltway. Big difference.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Another data point exemplifying why I am so grateful we spent extra money to live in a walkable neighborhood.

I can't even imagine the daily hell of having to involve the beltway in our child getting to school - what an awful way to live.

Huh?

+1
PP clearly has zero understanding of the issue.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It frequently takes my dd 45-60 minutes to get to extra curriculars ar Marshall in the 5-6:00 hour. Perhaps we should start a petition to close the ramp to 495 from route 7. It’s unfair for us to be sooooo inconvenienced. There is no other way to get in and out of the school other than using route 7. And if the ramp at Georgetown pike is closed, then the traffic will move to route 7 to get onto the beltway.

Except that GTP is two lanes and Route 7 is eight lanes, so no one on Route 7 is trapped the way that GTP people are trapped. Plus, now most every route, including Route 7 - has sidewalks, but most of GTP does not have sidewalks, not the abutting neighborhoods, so traffic in that particular area is a legitimate safety issue. Apples and oranges. Know what you are talking about before you prattle on.

This, exactly. That's the problem with people who don't even live in the area or understand what the issue is. They add nothing to the conversation.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It frequently takes my dd 45-60 minutes to get to extra curriculars ar Marshall in the 5-6:00 hour. Perhaps we should start a petition to close the ramp to 495 from route 7. It’s unfair for us to be sooooo inconvenienced. There is no other way to get in and out of the school other than using route 7. And if the ramp at Georgetown pike is closed, then the traffic will move to route 7 to get onto the beltway.

Except that GTP is two lanes and Route 7 is eight lanes, so no one on Route 7 is trapped the way that GTP people are trapped. Plus, now most every route, including Route 7 - has sidewalks, but most of GTP does not have sidewalks, not the abutting neighborhoods, so traffic in that particular area is a legitimate safety issue. Apples and oranges. Know what you are talking about before you prattle on.

Wow. Who do you think has been fighting sidewalks and the widening of GTP all these years. Hint: not Marshall families.

Good grief. Do you know anything about the topic of this thread?? Did you know GTP is an historical byway and is *protected* from widening? But sure, blame those awful Langley families!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Well then, let them bring it.

May not have to if VDOT, Foust, Murphy and Favola figure out a way to get Maryland drivers off our local roads.

One can only hope. I guarantee, if VA drivers were clogging up MD local roads in order to avoid paying MD tolls, there would be a huge outcry.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

May not have to if VDOT, Foust, Murphy and Favola figure out a way to get Maryland drivers off our local roads.

+1000!

And yet Maryland continues to do nothing to alleviate the Beltway congestion. Virginia built out Route 28 and Maryland was supposed to meet it to have another route. Never happened. Virginia built the HOT lanes. Maryland refused. That backup of drivers on 495 from Virginia into Maryland begins at 2pm. Something needs to happen.

+2000

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Then get to the meeting on Thursday at McLean HS at 7pm to voice your support for VDOT's proposal to close the NB ramp. Interesting that they made it MHS rather than Langley. Must have figured no one would make the meeting due to commuter traffic clogging the Georgetown Pike!

So true!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Possibly closing an off ramp because it makes it difficult for kids to get to extracurricular? Really? There are a number of inside the beltway schools that have traffic issues - should we just start closing roads to benefit school traffic? What am I missing?

Why does Langley high school convenience get to dictate access and ramp closures on a major highway?

This is completely unreasonable.

I bet if it were any other high school, you'd be fine with it. Just the fact that it's Langley means you are outraged.

That's just silly. It's reasonable for parents whose kids attend other schools near Tysons (Marshall, McLean, Madison) to want to know whether you're asking VDOT to make it easier to get to Cooper and Langley will just make it harder to get to their schools. I haven't heard a clear answer, and VDOT officials have said previously that closing the ramp would be a "wash" (i.e., reduce traffic near the Balls Hill/Georgetown Pike intersection and make it worse elsewhere).

[Anonymous]

Honestly this is what toll roads do. I live of 7 and every time the Dulles Toll road increases rates, 7 gets increasingly more crowded. It's not that people don't want to take the toll road, it's that for a lot of people in this area, they can't afford to take the toll road. It really is an issue with the tolls on 66 and the dulles toll road. $20 a week means they can't put food on the table (and it's more than $20).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Well then, let them bring it.

May not have to if VDOT, Foust, Murphy and Favola figure out a way to get Maryland drivers off our local roads.

One can only hope. I guarantee, if VA drivers were clogging up MD local roads in order to avoid paying MD tolls, there would be a huge outcry.

Honestly, this sounds like a toll road policy problem, not an exit problem.

VA in my opinion is making traffic worse and causing more problems by adding all these toll roads.

The toll roads are empty most of the time and all the other roads, including neighborhood roads, are clogged and congested.

VA should have added extra roads, making half of them HOV and the rest regular traffic, and nixed the toll road concept.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Another data point exemplifying why I am so grateful we spent extra money to live in a walkable neighborhood.

I can't even imagine the daily hell of having to involve the beltway in our child getting to school - what an awful way to live.

The issue isn't using the beltway to get our kids to school. It's trying to use our local roads and finding them backed up due to MD drivers using them as access to the Beltway. Big difference.

For Langley this is only an issue inside the beltway, not outside it. The MD drivers are going a different direction than the buses from school to outer beltway suburban neighborhoods.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Possibly closing an off ramp because it makes it difficult for kids to get to extracurricular? Really? There are a number of inside the beltway schools that have traffic issues - should we just start closing roads to benefit school traffic? What am I missing?

Why does Langley high school convenience get to dictate access and ramp closures on a major highway?

This is completely unreasonable.

I bet if it were any other high school, you'd be fine with it. Just the fact that it's Langley means you are outraged.

That's just silly. It's reasonable for parents whose kids attend other schools near Tysons (Marshall, McLean, Madison) to want to know whether you're asking VDOT to make it easier to get to Cooper and Langley will just make it harder to get to their schools. I haven't heard a clear answer, and VDOT officials have said previously that closing the ramp would be a "wash" (i.e., reduce traffic near the Balls Hill/Georgetown Pike intersection and make it worse elsewhere).

Of course it won't be a wash. It would just clog up other roads.

And I don't see why closing off Georgetown Pike going east has much of an effect on the buses traveling west.