Trucks Included in Maryland’s Updated Safety Plan
Maryland Department of Transportation
Addressing risks associated with commercial motor vehicles is an objective outlined in the Maryland Department of Transportation’s recently released highway safety plan.
The 2021-2025 Maryland Strategic Highway Safety Plan, released Jan. 28, identifies strategies and actions meant to help eliminate fatalities on state roadways.
Between 2015 and 2019, some 11.5% of fatal crashes in Maryland involved a commercial motor vehicle. As strategies to addressing truck-related risks, the plan proposes advancing efforts supporting infrastructure modifications to reduce fatalities involving freight vehicles and educating drivers, enforcement officers and motor carriers about trucking regulations and visibility issues.
Maritime Activity Reports, Inc.
(Photo: The Maryland Port Administration)
The Maryland Department of Transportation Maryland Port Administration (MDOT MPA) and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) are marking a milestone of environmental stewardship this month on the landmark restoration of Poplar Island near Talbot County. Simultaneously, the agencies are advancing plans for their next partnership using dredged materials to preserve and protect Maryland’s waterways: the Mid-Chesapeake Bay Island Ecosystem Restoration.
Since 1998, Poplar Island has been Maryland’s primary site for reuse of sediment dredged from shipping channels leading to the Helen Delich Bentley Port of Baltimore. Construction for the island’s final expansion, adding four new wetland cells and one upland cell, was completed January 20. The expansion adds 575 acres and capacity for 28 million cubic yards of material.
State Roundup: Dem leaders push $520M in relief targeting small biz, vulnerable Marylanders
The State Senate Jan. 22, 2021. MarylandReporter.com photo
DEMS PROPOSE $520M TARGETED RELIEF PACKAGE: Senate Democratic leaders Wednesday unveiled a $520 million coronavirus fiscal relief package aimed at helping both the state’s small businesses and its most vulnerable communities survive the pandemic, Bryan Renbaum of Maryland Reporter writes.
The Senate’s “Recovery Now” plan runs a wide gamut of priorities: sending millions to food banks and fire departments; wiping out utility and rental debt for a few thousand families; awarding grants for businesses, artists and nonprofits; paying $1,000 to tens of thousands of people stuck in limbo in the unemployment system; restoring buses and trains to pre-pandemic service levels; and funding “wellmobiles” to administer doses of the coronavirus vaccine, Pamela Wood of the Sun reports.
change volume NBC 4 Transportation Reporter Adam Tuss on plans to add toll lanes to the Montgomery County Beltway and 270
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After years of study, the Maryland Department of Transportation has chosen its “preferred alternative” for Gov. Larry Hogan’s plan to expand portions of the Capital Beltway and Interstate 270 in Montgomery County, the agency announced on Wednesday.
MDOT selected Alternative 9, which will add four High Occupancy Toll (HOT) lanes two in each direction to I-495 between the American Legion Bridge and the I-270 spurs, and to I-270 between the Beltway and Interstate 70 in Frederick.
Maryland, citing pandemic, delays release of draft study for third Bay Bridge span Katherine Shaver Maryland officials have delayed the release of a draft study exploring where to build a third span for the Chesapeake Bay Bridge, saying they had to postpone federally required public hearings due to the worsening pandemic. The study, which analyzed the community and environmental impacts of three potential corridors for an additional span, was scheduled to be released last fall, said John Sales, spokesman for the Maryland Transportation Authority. Public hearings on the findings were scheduled for this winter. The state was on track to meet that schedule, Sales said, until coronavirus infection rates and “associated restrictions” increased. A plan to release the findings in December also was pushed back due to climbing coronavirus cases, he said.