A local legislator says too many drivers travel at a high rate of speed on that highway.
Libertytown, Md. (KM) The Maryland State Highway Administration is scheduled to unveil some traffic calming methods this week in Libertytown. “Route 26 has become a thoroughfare for people and their GPS’. And we’ve had some serious and even fatal accidents on Route 26 in Libertytown,” says Frederick County Delegate Kathy Afzali (R).
She says she has held meetings with residents, the State Highway Administration, the Sheriff’s Office and trucking companies to try to come up with solutions. Afzali says she asked the SHA to come up with some traffic calming measures, and the agency will bring them forward to citizens on Tuesday, August 23rd from 5:30 PM until 7:30 PM at the Libertytown Fire Hall, 12027 South Street in Libertytown.
Afzali acknowledges that SHA will be dealing with competing interests as it drafts the traffic calming methods. “People like the fire department there who don’t want dividers, who don’t want turnarounds; then you have the residents who do want that, and do want what we call more like a streetscape situation. And they you have others who don’t want anything done at all, and want to go forward and go as fast as they can,” she says.
But in Libertytown, some residents feel the situation is too dangerous. “When you have people who have a driveway right there on Route 26 and they put their blinker on and they want to make a left turn into their driveway, and somebody behind them is doing 65-miles per hour, they sometime don’t have time to respond and to react, and where we’ve seen some of these terrible accidents on the road,” says Afzali.
And there are residents who are worried about their children who attend Liberty Elementary School which is along Route 26. “Part of the challenge there is also is the Libertytown Elementary School is there in that community, and there’s no sidewalk. And there’s really no way for the children to walk to school just given the speed of the traffic and the layout of that road,” Afzali says.
She says she’s waiting with fingers crossed for the solution that the SHA will reveal on Tuesday, and hopes residents are happy with what is presented.