Maryland

The National Weather Service said that here in Frederick MD we got the heaviest snowfall of anywhere in the Washington DC/Baltimore metro area in the Big Snow of Feb 5/6 - 33.8 inches, 86cm. Alexandria VA was reported at a respectable 28.9in 73cm. DC itself got a feeble 17.8in 45cm. All that hot air?

Toll people got a good belly laugh at the Chicago Tribune recently with their headline that referred to TransCore as a "troubled" company. "Tollway sticks with troubled customer-service firm" ran the headline Dec 17.

Maryland's Intercounty Connector (ICC or MD200) in the northern suburbs of Washington DC metro area will manage free flow with tolls that could vary between 10c/mile and 35c/mile (6c/km to 22c/km) for cars.

Maryland's proposed high toll rates for the new Inter County Connector are in line with those suggested by Wilbur Smith Associates to maximize revenues. Yesterday Maryland Transportation (Toll) Authority (MdTA) announced high toll rates in the range 25 to 35c/mile in the peak hours and 20c to 30c/mile offpeak for cars with a minimum 3-mile toll, and a $3/toll video surcharge.

Maryland authorities are proposing toll rates for cars of 25c to 35c/mile peak hours (6 to 9am, 4 to 7pm workdays) and 20c to 30c/mile offpeak - metric: 16c to 22c/km peak and 12c to 19c/km off-peak.

Maryland (Toll) Transportation Authority (MDTA) lost 2,090 E-ZPass in July, the first month in which a $1.50 monthly maintenance fee applies. 4,990 customers dropped their accounts and about 2,800 new E-Zpass accounts were opened. At the end of July there were 557k Maryland E-ZPass accounts.

A Baltimore lawyer who represents the family of a John Short who died last August 10 when his tractor trailer effortlessly pushed through the parapet wall and plunged off the Chesapeake Bay Bridge is likely to sue the bridge operator Maryland Transportation (Toll) Authority (MDTA) for negligence. Attorney Keith Franz says the bridge may meet 1950s standards, but it isn't maintained and operated according to contemporary standards.

Maryland (Toll) Transportation Authority (MdTA) is named as a defendant in a $19m law suit filed over the deaths of three men in a collision during two-way operations on the three lane 1973 span of the Chesapeake Bay Bridge at about 4pm May 10 2007.

The Inter County Connector in Montgomery County Maryland is about a third built and contracts for most of the rest of construction of the 19 miles of 6 lane tollroad are let. But diehard environmentalist opponents of this major addition to the highway network north of Washington DC still pretend to soldier on. The Sierra Club's Metro DC page still features the same old complaints, for example that the new tollroad will "promote sprawl development."

REPRINT of piece by Peter Samuel in Op-Ed page of DC Examiner:

Maryland Transportation (Toll) Authority (MdTA) almost a lone among toll agencies around the US is proposing to freeze car tolls and put the burden of toll inflation heavily on truckers with a mostly 50% increase. Charges for transponders are also to be increased. The truck & transponder heavy plan is aimed to increase revenues by $60m/year on the $280m of FY2008. That's a 21.4% increase.

Environmentalists have run up the white flag and agreed to end obstructionist efforts against the Inter County Connector (ICC) tollroad in Montgomery County Maryland, 15 miles (25km) north of the White House.

Maryland Transportation Authority (MdTA) reopened the right lane of the southern span of the Chesapeake Bay Bridge late Sunday, and contrary to warnings of horrendous queueing and disruptions, holiday traffic was described as flowing better than normal.

The famous Olympic Games traffic scare effect was in evidence - if you say how horrendous it's going to be, it won't be too bad.

The Maryland Bay Bridge editorial (link here) has generated some responses:

EDITORIAL: America's national capital region with a population of over 7.5 million people needs an elegant and efficient bridge on the way to the Atlantic coast. The existing pair of troubled, obsolete and ugly spans called the Chesapeake Bay Bridge need to be phased out, and a modern bridge put in their place.

Maryland Transportation Authority (MdTA) toll operators of the Chesapeake Bay Bridge say they have to close a lane on the damaged southern span 24/7 for two to three weeks because they need to make urgent repairs to the southern parapet of the southern span. This at the height of the summer travel season on a bridge that constitutes a bottleneck even with all five lanes in operation. (UPDATE: the closures could go on for ten weeks it is now being said. See bottom.)

Officials say a car driver falling asleep at the wheel and veering into the path of a truck traveling the other direction during two-way operations was the cause of the crash that sent the truck crashing down into Chesapeake Bay last Sunday morning. The car driver, a 19 year old woman, told police at the hospital and a Washington Post reporter by telephone that she fell asleep at the wheel. It was 4am.

Maryland's notorious Chesapeake Bay Bridge suffered another fatal collision in two-way traffic on Sunday morning. A tractor trailer struck a car in the opposing direction of traffic at around 4am, lost control, neatly punched out a section of concrete parapet and plunged 10m (35ft) into the waters of the Bay.

The driver was killed.

Environmental extremists have gained sponsorship of a bill in the Maryland general assembly which would halt work on the Inter County Connector tollroad in Montgomery County. The bill HB1416 would require a study of the 'greenhouse gas' emissions impact of opening this road.

US District Court in Maryland has thrown out a late law suit lodged by a bunch of environmentalist groups against USDOT's permitting of the Inter County Connector (ICC) tollroad north of the District of Columbia. Judge Alexander Williams in a 106 page judgment concludes that "there is no legal or equitable basis to prevent the Inter-County Connector from moving forward."