Red Line should be done right or not at all, says Warren Smith. (Photo by Fern Shen)

Neighborhood Voices from the Red Line Route:
WARREN SMITH

Warren Smith drives trucks for a living. He’s also an active citizen of west Baltimore and passionately interested in transit policy.

Add all those up and you get a pretty unambiguous position on the Red Line: Smith thinks that the 4C option, especially the above-ground portion in west Baltimore, is going to be unsafe, lacking in transit “connectivity” and disruptive to the neighborhoods it passes through.

“We do need the jobs. We also need to do something that’s monumental, instead of disastrous,” said Smith, who is on the MTA’s Citizens Advisory Council and is the president of the Greater West Hills Community Association.

In his view, the Red Line is all about the business community and politicians pouncing on federal money for short-term gain (contracts, jobs, making a splash) without any thought to long-term consequences.

“It’s about the federal money and the employment and spreading the wealth among the illuminati,” said Smith, who is also a member of the East-West Coalition Against Redline Option 4C and who argues that the right way to do the Red Line is to put it underground on the east and west sides.

Rail cars in the median, at the center of busy Edmondson Avenue, will be a safety hazard, he argues. “Emergency vehicles will not be able to see across the street,” he said. “An ambulance won’t be able to turn around easily because a train will be blocking it.”

Attempting to cross Edmondson Avenue during rush hour. (Photo by Fern Shen)

What about the mile-long single-tracked portion of the tunnel under Cook’s Lane, where Smith lives? “Another DC disaster-in-the-making,” he said drily. And the claim that the project won’t squeeze property owners along Edmondson Avenue?

“They’re taking sidewalks,” he said. “They need four feet. But they are walking through neighborhoods saying they are only going to take four inches.” (The MTA’s Draft Environmental Impact Statement for the project backs him up, he says.)

Jean Allen, who lives near Edmondson Avenue in Edgewood, thinks the Red Line will hurt more than help.

Jean Allen, of the Edgewood Neighborhood Association, agrees that a surface Red Line would disrupt the neighborhood more than help it. She says that the elderly, who use a local senior center, would have to walk an extra two blocks to cross the street.

“We have 40 businesses that depend on people being able to park their cars and they are going to be hurt,” said Allen, 69, who joined Smith for the interview. Drivers being able to use the Red Line — which may not go where they need to go — will not make up for that.”

“People who live in the counties will use this,” Allen said. “It’s for them to not have the traffic when they go between their homes and downtown. That’s it.”

Like many other Red Line opponents, they both feel that citizens’ opinions have been ignored in the project decision-making process. Smith, for instance, tried in July to get the CAC to rescind an earlier vote endorsing 4C, in light of the intense opposition from the east and west sides of town. But his motion failed, even though a majority of the 11 members present voted “yes” to rescind.

The chair, according to a brief account posted to the Baltimore Sun’s “Getting There” blog, ruled they needed a 2/3 majority.

- by FERN SHEN
Fern Shen is the editor/publisher of Baltimore Brew

Red Line Stories Recently Brewed:
Today:
“Canton to Red Line backers: it ain’t over yet”

Previously:
“Surface Red Line would squeeze out cars – and that’s good!”
previously:
“Transit Line Could Uplift a Struggling Baltimore Community”

“Transit Line a Burden, not a boon, for thriving, car-centric Canton”

“Time for Some Myth-busting on Baltimore’s Red Line, Says a Believer”

“Baltimore’s Red Line? Better for Developers Than Transit Riders.”