Removing red lights still at center of Roem’s Route 28 plan

PRINCE WILLIAM COUNTY — In her effort to keep the lights of shining on the issue of Route 28 congestion, the Virginia Delegate Danica Roem remains steadfast on removing them.

From Fairfax to Manassas, traffic lights, she says, are the bane of existence for commuters who use the road.

“As long as that light at Compton [Road] is there, we’re all screwed,” Roem told about 50 people at a January 3 town hall meeting near Manassas Park. “It backs up traffic into our district every day. Just because that light is in Fairfax doesn’t mean I don’t care about it.”

Route 28 has been dubbed Northern Virginia’s most congested road, and there’s a plan to build a $220 million bypass that officials say will ease traffic along the road. It would extend Godwin Drive near Novant/UVA Health System Prince William Medical Center to Route 28, but some have questioned whether it would provide congestion relief or just create a new way for commuters from western Prince William County to avoid using I-66.

Roem, a Democrat, made fixing Route 28 her central issue in her 2017 campaign when she was elected to serve residents of the 13th District. Previous bills in the House of Delegates to force the study of new intersections along the route — intersections without signal lights — have all failed.

This year, she hopes to resurrect the study with a new bill, and with help from state and local officials in neighboring Fauquier County. Broader support, she hopes, will lead to action in Richmond.

Roem proposes studying the entire length of Route 28 from its beginning at Route 29 in Fauquier County to Interstate 66 in Centreville, looking at what safety improvements could be done, and to provide a glimpse of a Route 28 in Prince William County sans traffic lights.

When it comes to improving the road, Prince William County has already invested, widening it from four to six lanes between Nokesville and Linton Hall roads in Bristow. A and final phase of the project will widen the road from four to six lanes between Linton Hall Road and Pennsylvania Avenue, inching closer to the Manassas City line.

Though there’s no talk of removing signals on Route 28 in Fauquier County, (there’s only three along the entire 13-mile stretch of road in the county) there, they say the road could be safer. A mix of commuters and farmers use the road every day.

“I support safety improvements and a dedicated center turn lane through the Catlett service district as well as a possible roundabout at the Calverton intersection and wider shoulders throughout the [Route] 28 corridor,” Fauquier County Board of Supervisors Chairman Chris Butler told Potomac Local in an email.

Butler also said legislators need to look into stiffer penalties for drivers who won’t put down their cell phones when behind the wheel, and for those who ignore school bus stop arms.

While Roem may have support for a study in Fauquier County, her plan to remove signal lights is nowhere to be found on the Northern Virginia Transportation Authority six-year spending plan. The governing body decides how to spend about $190 million in funds levied by gas and sales taxes hiked in 2013.

A portion of those funds will go to Route 28 widening project between Linton Hall Road and Pennsylvania Avenue, and widening between Route 29 and I-66 in Fairfax County. It will also fund an intersection improvement on Route 234 — similar to the ones Roem wants for Route 28 — at University Boulevard, removing the signal light there.

Roem told town hall attendees that officials at the Virginia Department of Transportation told her that her intersection improvement study could be funded by the department’s current budget. There’s also other pots of money to pull from to improve Route 28, she adds, like Virginia’s Smart Scale funding program.

The NVTA last year saw about $35 million of its funding for road and transit projects snatched away and given to Metro to help shore up the regional heavy rail system.

“It’s OK for Metro to have dedicated funding. It is not good for NVTA to lose $70 million over two years to fund it,” said Roem.

She supports resurrecting an effort that last year died on a party-line vote — a five-cent hike on the state’s grantor’s tax on newly purchased homes, and a 1 percent increase to the hotel tax — to restore the NVTA funding that was lost to Metro.

In addition, the Prince William County Board of Supervisors this year is expected to float the idea of a “mobility bond” that could address congestion issues like the ones on Route 28.

Roem’s steadfast strategy for the removal of traffic lights is reminiscent of her Republican predecessor Bob Marshall who, for years, unsuccessfully lobbied for the addition of reversible lanes on Route 28 similar to the old high-occupancy vehicle lanes turned toll lanes on I-95.

“I’m willing to do whatever it takes to get something done when it comes to reducing traffic,” said Roem.