For Baltimore’s mayor, many issues are tough
This one at Loch Raven is not
On Tuesday, Baltimore Mayor Brandon M. Scott lifted the masking requirement he had put in place for City Hall during the pandemic. “With this announcement,” he said in a news release, “we take one more step toward returning city business to a state of normalcy after a long and difficult chapter in our history.”
Great.
But I have a question: If we’re taking steps toward normalcy, why won’t the mayor order Loch Raven Drive, along Loch Raven Reservoir in Baltimore County, closed to traffic for a few hours on Saturdays and Sundays as it was each weekend going back decades before the pandemic?
Sorry to bring this up again. I was hoping I wouldn’t have to. I had hoped that the mayor or someone in City Hall or in the Department of Public Works might have read my column of April 25 and said: “Oh, yeah, it’s time to close the gates again to let walkers and bikers have a stretch of road in the reservoir free of traffic, just like in the good old days.”
But that didn’t happen. The opposite happened. The city, owner of the reservoir, just said no.
Jim Clemmens, who used to take traffic-free, weekend walks on Loch Raven Drive and would like to do so again, shared with me an emailed letter he received from Blair Adams, communications officer at DPW, that arrived on Saturday morning. I’ll quote it in full:
“The City of Baltimore and the Department of Public Works (DPW) recognizes the public’s interest in using the Loch Raven Reservoir for recreational use. The closing of Loch Raven Drive between Providence
Road and Morgan Mill Road would stress our resources for our environmental police staff and our watershed employees. Therefore, the gates will continue to remain open seven days a week.
“DPW Reservoirs are not parks — and the primary usage is to protect our water source and not to be utilized as a primary park. Throughout the reservoir, there are trails for walkers, hikers, bikers and horseback riders that are clearly marked and identified. With the gates remaining open, this will allow access for our emergency responders, and allow for additional parking along the roadways for those interested in accessing the trails.”
This is far less gibberish-ish than the note Adams sent me a couple of weeks ago when I asked why the city did not resume the practice it had before the pandemic. Closing a 1.6-mile stretch of roadway to traffic for seven hours on Saturday and seven on Sunday was routine before March 2020, but now it would stress the staff at the reservoir? In what way? Or does that mean there is less staffing out there on weekends?
And, about that “reservoirs are not parks” business: True, but look at the list of activities that take place out there already. There’s also a fishing center, managed by Baltimore County’s Department
of Recreation and Parks, where you can rent and launch a boat, or rent and launch canoes and kayaks. It’s a busy place on weekends. So, while Loch Raven might not be listed as a public park in the conventional sense, parts of it resemble one.
So let’s just say I’m not convinced that having a pedestrian-friendly stretch of road for 14 hours a week — something that was done for at least four decades, long before the pandemic — is such a burden now.
Personnel note: The letter Adams wrote to Clemmens might have been one of her last in her role at DPW. She has just been promoted to deputy director for the Mayor’s Office of Communications. She got that job after another shake-up in the funny-if-it-wasn’t-so-ridiculous, high-turnover Scott administration.
Meanwhile, back at DPW, Jason Mitchell is in the final furlongs of his short trip as the department’s director. He came to Baltimore just two years ago and had a bumpy ride. He took a lot of heat about the department’s handling of an outbreak of E. coli in the city’s drinking water system, and some members of the Baltimore City Council have criticized him for reducing the collection of recyclables. In January, Mitchell said he would resign and leave his post in April. He then agreed to remain with the department through June 30.
That’s why I’m not convinced that the DPW’s decision about Loch Raven Drive is well-informed and credible.
More than 3,200 people have signed the online petition asking the mayor to close the gates on the drive from 10 a.m. until 5 p.m. each Saturday and Sunday.
Instead of just saying no, and looking like a party pooper, the Scott administration needs to show a little imagination here.
Why not close the gates one weekend a month and ease back into the old routine?
If staffing is a problem, how about a little citycounty cooperation? Scott could ask Johnny Olszewski, the county executive, for some help.
You’d think, with all the big challenges on his plate, the mayor would want to quickly dispense with the easy stuff — especially the stuff that makes people happy — and move on.
If I was mayor, I’d order the gates closed and put up life-size, smiling cutouts of myself and Johnny O. at each end of the road, with a cartoon bubble and the words: “Please enjoy your traffic-free promenade!”
That’s it. That’s my advice. My job is done here.