SCHOOL RAGE: RESIDENTS QUESTION HIGH-DENSITY WESTBARD PLAN, NEW ES SITES NOT LARGE ENOUGH (PHOTOS)

"This is crazy!"

UPDATED: 12:30 AM, November 16, 2014*

Friday brought one of the most contentious meetings of the Westbard Sector Plan charrette, and not surprisingly, the topic was schools. Current and future public school parents in the Wood Acres-Pyle-Whitman cluster acutely aware of existing overcrowding questioned how Montgomery County planners could recommend a high-density growth plan for Westbard in that context.

Concept 1 - all of the red
structures are new apartment
buildings

Planners released their first projections for total housing units, and students to be generated by the plan, at the meeting. Those numbers were met with skepticism. Under a full build-out of Concept 1, Westbard residents would find 2529 apartments dropped into their community. That would, under the current U.S. census bureau statistic of 2.58 persons per housing unit, bring 6525 new residents (and 4932 additional cars!) to the 153 acres that comprise the Westbard Sector. In other words, 43 people per acre, which is quite a change from the area's single-family-home suburban character.

The Planning Department projection calculated Friday predicts 306 new students, with 153 of them being elementary school students. Those numbers generated some grumbling among the crowd of residents at the meeting. If one has been on Westbard Avenue when the school buses stop there in the morning, you know there are quite a few students coming from those few buildings now. In fact, Park Bethesda alone has 59 students, and Westwood Tower adds 65. Unfortunately, the chart shown did not have the numbers for the Kenwood Place condominium, which is also in the Walt Whitman HS cluster.

Bruce Crispell of MCPS
on the hot seat Friday

MCPS' infamous forecaster Bruce Crispell made a late arrival to the meeting, but tried to generate some numbers more in line with what we've seen in the Westbard area. Crispell's calculator gave him a projection of 750 students, more than double what planners forecast - and equal to the size of the entire Wood Acres ES population, one resident noted. In the context of 6525 people coming under Concept 1, 750 still sounds a bit low.

Under Concept 2, the numbers are lower. From those 1386 units, planners forecast 199 students, with 97 of them being at the elementary level. Crispell's number was 425, again more than double, but still sounding a bit off the mark for 3576 new residents (bringing 2703 cars with them to the community, by the way).

"Why are we building

more housing?"

Clearly, I think MCPS forecasters need to apply a new "Westbard" or "Whitman" factor to their prediction formula. The residential community that surrounds, and is served by, the commercial-retail Westbard area is one of the most desirable in America. Atop the list of Pros that make it so is the Whitman school cluster. When you ask yourself how much do people want to live here, just remember: 30 billionaires are actually willing to pay well over a million dollars, to live in a cramped townhouse in the middle of a contaminated industrial dump off of Little Falls Parkway.

Much has been made of the supposed lone student who has been generated by that unfinished townhome development being the norm for that type of housing. But remember, those homes are in the BCC district, not Whitman. Fair or not, most well-off parents moving here want Whitman. I think one can reasonably expect student generation rates to exceed those of virtually any other community in America.

Map of current schools in
the area; not shown are
several leased to private
schools by MCPS

The other problem? "We're already bursting at the seams," as one parent put it so well yesterday. Community members actually forecast the number of students that would eventually attend Wood Acres better than MCPS did, noted Springfield Civic Association President Phyllis Edelman. Another parent made the excellent point that the county and state can't even fund a new gym at Pyle Middle School, where students now take gym in a hallway - so how can they fund entire new schools? "This is crazy," she said, asking why developers aren't being asked to shoulder more of the burden they are creating.

"We don't want it."

Earlier in the morning, the new president of the Sumner Citizens Association - who moved here six months ago for the schools in the Whitman cluster, said "now I'm thinking, well, shoot, maybe I'm not going to get the benefit of this school system like I thought." Several parents expressed frank opinions that the quality of schools in the Whitman cluster is today being degraded by class size, lack of space and reduced amenities caused by overcrowding. 

One bright spot in both plan concepts is a new elementary school site near Westbard Avenue. There are two problems with that, however. As Rob Snow, a parent and officer with the Springfield Civic Association noted, "ignoring the impact on middle schools and high schools is silly." Crispell said there simply is no room left in the area for a new middle or high school.

"We bought for

Whitman and Pyle."

The other big problem? It turns out that neither proposed school site is big enough. Planners say they are going to pitch a new type of taller, "urban school" to MCPS. But there is no guarantee that MCPS will adopt that, meaning that the promised new school could go unbuilt. Even moving Ridgefield Road eastward won't expand that site large enough to meet the current 7.5 acre MCPS standard for elementary schools. It would seem that reality should be addressed now, and a larger site found before the plan is finalized in April 2015.

Planner Marc DeOcampo stressed that the concepts shown were hypothetical full build-outs, which are unlikely to occur, he said. However, if you apply the "Whitman" factor, my guess is that you'll see developers moving quickly in this area to build once the plan passes, than you would in Wheaton or Long Branch. One has to ask where the impetus for high-density urbanization of Westbard is coming from. Certainly not the residents. DeOcampo concurs, noting that "85-90% of the comments we've heard are, 'Keep it low density.'"

A final hybrid concept with some options will be presented this coming Tuesday night, November 18, at 7:00 PM at Westland Middle School. If you have concerns, this is the time to come out and express them.

* The article was updated to correct the estimated number of vehicles per unit that would be brought to Westbard under Concept 1 and Concept 2, based on the latest statistical data.