Text Box: May  2006
Text Box: COUNCIL DISCUSSES
OXFORD ROAD POSITION
By Sophie Keefer

	The town council last month considered if it should offer an official position on the National Park Service proposals to alter the traffic pattern for entering and exiting Glen Echo Park.
	Mayor Debbie Beers said that she was not sure the town has an official opinion on which the council could agree.  She said the town attorney was looking into the matter of who owns Oxford Road -- the park or the town.  In her view, she said, it shouldn’t matter who owns the road; if the park is creating a problem, they should pay for a solution.
	Town Councilman Dan Macy said that the town would only need to take a position if it disagreed with the position taken by the park and that he was personally opposed to the park’s second option, in which traffic past the entrance intersection would have to be controlled by a NPS employee with a mobile barrier.
	Mayor Beers said that the second option was problematic because Oxford Road is a snow emergency route, in an agreement by the town with FEMA that was entered into following the 1996 snow storm.  Councilman Steve Matney also noted that option two is problematic because heavy vehicles must use Oxford Road to enter the Town.
	The mayor agreed to send an e-mail to the park about these two points (snow route and use by heavy vehicles).

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