by Sarah Gantz | Staff Writer Gazette
Montgomery County’s Department of Transportation is tapping into neighborhood and community organizations to keep abreast of pedestrian and traffic problems, as its dwindling budget provides less money to address traffic concerns.
Input from neighborhood groups is becoming increasingly valuable to the county’s pedestrian safety initiative, a program launched in 2008 that identifies and addresses high accident incidence areas, builds sidewalks and includes in development projects reports of how the project would affect pedestrian and bicycle safety. The pedestrian safety initiative initially had a budget of almost $5 million in fiscal 2010 that was cut to $3.6 million in fiscal 2011, said Jeff Dunckel, the county’s pedestrian safety coordinator.
"The problem has historically been we’re reactive — where there are problems, we respond," Dunckel said. "We’re changing the program to make it proactive."
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https://www.gazette.net/stories/01122011/bethnew203558_32548.phpoldId.20110113182913439
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