Honest assessment from those that live in Maryland, is it better than NoVa? Why? (Frederick: college, bus)

[Zimar]

Originally Posted by pgtvatitans

You know what you are right. Pat yourself on the back. You did a great job breaking down my argument. Kudos, you're the man. I am going to nominate you for best poster.

This is the best post you've ever written.

[justtitans]

Originally Posted by cry_havoc

Lets assume that is true, and that is a big assumption based off no facts that MD drivers cause the problems, it is still a VA problem.

Traffic still better in MD. Also notice that when these people drive through MD to get to VA it isnt so bad. Strange.

Ill take the better traffic.

Get some popcorn, go to 495 at Route 1 in Alexandria and watch the amount of traffic going over the Wilson Bridge during rush hour in the evening.

[justtitans]

Originally Posted by Steelers10

Just think, a long time ago when I left the bank to go back to school one thing I was told on the way out was that there's no money in education. NoVA does have a lot of advantages as an economic powerhouse because they are still attached to a classic "Southern" state. Despite it's economic power, NoVA will never have sufficient self-determination over the allocation of these financial resources and the ability to use these relative advantages over the MD 'burbs for improvements in NoVA, thus nullifying the advantages.

Atlanta is what NoVA could be if NoVA could some how topple (or at least destabilize) the power of the General Assembly in Richmond. Georgia used to be governed by a county-unit system which gave an overwhelmingly disproportionate share of the state's political power to rural counties and Atlanta was essentially a further South equivalent of Richmond. However the Supreme Court struck down the county-unit system as unconstitutional in the 1960s and that allowed Atlanta to take off and become the preeminent metropolis in the South.

But with this takeoff, metro Atlanta became a detached Northern New Jersey. You are hard pressed to find an Atlantan now who is actually from Atlanta unless it's Paces Ferry old money or an African American on the West Side. Georgia without metro Atlanta makes Mississippi look like Connecticut. Despite Atlanta's ascendency, Georgia as a state wields very little national clout.

Richmond sacrificed growth for power. And power it has. Like Atlanta, not a lot of native Virginians are large population proportions in NoVA municipalities. However, this allows Richmond to keep NoVA off political balance. The US Supreme Court has been (un)surprisingly permissive in Virginia's attempts to keep political power out of the hands of NoVA. This read is long but pretty instructive:

http://www.redistrictingonline.org/u...chLRev2013.pdf

As I stated in my previous posts, Virginia was able to keep power in the hands of rural elected officials and disproportionately in Richmond. However, after the 1960s the Supreme Court was more interested in gerrymandering and racial balance rather than urban vs. rural, thus playing right into the hands of Virginia's independent cities system in which many of these cities are really just counties. Virginia blacks are willing to go to bat to get adequate representation. The problem with NoVA is the paucity of blacks (Virginia natives or otherwise) to carry the "civil rights" mantle. Arlington, Alexandria, and Fairfax might as well be in Maryland at this point and even though PWC has always had a significant number of native Virginia blacks, PWC's delegation (and that of Loudoun's) is dominated by Republicans who fall in lockstep with the RoVA political machine. The fact that PWC and Loudoun at least have two Democratic Senators (political party is irrelevant, it's all "good ol boy" networking) in the General Assembly is probably the only thing that keeps Virginia from one party rule like Maryland.

Maryland has of course its faults. To this day it still has vestiges of county boss rule with delegations in rural counties that shouldn't even have them based on population. But due to Baltimore's ascendancy long ago (how many people outside of Maryland even know where Annapolis is?), political power was placed in the hands of the population centers: MoCo, PG County, the city of Baltimore, and BaltCo adjacent to the city. There will be no Spiro Agnew's rising up from county boss to political power anymore. After Agnew, the Maryland governorship has been dominated by Baltimoreans and then Glendening who was from PG County. Hughes was rural, but a Democrat and environmentalist. I mean how many states elected big city mayors as governor?

Northern Virginia has developmental advantages over the Maryland suburbs because the General Assembly will trick out NoVA to maximum extent to bring in money. But Maryland's political power lies in MoCo and PG County and in Baltimore. As long as the PG/MoCo and Baltimore can coordinate, they can shape the destiny and development of the DC Suburbs of MD in a way that NoVA will never be allowed to by Richmond.

Outstanding stuff.

[cry_havoc]

Originally Posted by pgtvatitans

Get some popcorn, go to 495 at Route 1 in Alexandria and watch the amount of traffic going over the Wilson Bridge during rush hour in the evening.

Ive seen it backed up both ways.

[justtitans]

Originally Posted by cry_havoc

Ive seen it backed up both ways.

Just like ALL VA roads get backed up

Maybe you need to get your prescription checked. I have had to go both ways and there is a noticeable difference on each side. I made a thread about it a few months ago and others made the same observation.

[Steelers10]

Originally Posted by Zimar

This is the best post you've ever written.

I'd give you more rep points but you know City-Data won't let me. Haters!

Naw I'm just playin' City-Data, don't get all the Mods together and do me like you do:


University of Florida Taser Incident (taser portion) - YouTube

[cry_havoc]

Originally Posted by pgtvatitans

Just like ALL VA roads get backed up

Maybe you need to get your prescription checked. I have had to go both ways and there is a noticeable difference on each side. I made a thread about it a few months ago and others made the same observation.

Your observations are irrelevant. I observed the opposite. I dont wear glasses maybe you need to get YOUR prescription checked, or start wearing glasses if you arent.

Anyway Steelers10 schooled you on this. Subject is over.

[bornindc]

Originally Posted by EdwardA

A lot of the traffic in NOVA is due to people driving from MD to VA for their jobs.

I think there is something to this. I travel throughout DC, MD and VA regularly and my observation is that there are more people commuting to VA from MD than the reverse. I will note this is more obvious on the WWB than the Cabin John (or American Legion, whatever) bridge - the flow between Fairfax and Montgomery is pretty equal but it is clear more people commute from/through PG to Virginia than go the other way. It might explain why some in MD think traffic in VA is so much worse: they are driving in patterns with other Marylanders that increase traffic coming into/exiting VA (just a theory). A lot of the bad traffic in MD is getting to another jurisdiction, i.e. commuting into DC or VA. Just like in Virginia.

For the record, I consider MD and Virginia pretty similar. I would happily live in some parts of PG over places in Arlington; prefer parts of Manassas over some sections of Mongomery Co. It's all relative. Having lived in PG, Montgomery, DC, Alexandria City, Fairfax and Loudoun I can say this from some experience. (Obviously some posters here are on extremes preferring one or the other, and that's what it is, personal preference. I take these extremes with a grain of salt, as without a lot of experience it's easy to generalize. For example, and I hate to call you out here CryHavoc, but if you don't even know what county Manassas is in, I have to assume you don't know too much about it).

[cry_havoc]

Originally Posted by bornindc

I think there is something to this. I travel throughout DC, MD and VA regularly and my observation is that there are more people commuting to VA from MD than the reverse. I will note this is more obvious on the WWB than the Cabin John (or American Legion, whatever) bridge - the flow between Fairfax and Montgomery is pretty equal but it is clear more people commute from/through PG to Virginia than go the other way. It might explain why some in MD think traffic in VA is so much worse: they are driving in patterns with other Marylanders that increase traffic coming into/exiting VA (just a theory). A lot of the bad traffic in MD is getting to another jurisdiction, i.e. commuting into DC or VA. Just like in Virginia.

For the record, I consider MD and Virginia pretty similar. I would happily live in some parts of PG over places in Arlington; prefer parts of Manassas over some sections of Mongomery Co. It's all relative. Having lived in PG, Montgomery, DC, Alexandria City, Fairfax and Loudoun I can say this from some experience. (Obviously some posters here are on extremes preferring one or the other, and that's what it is, personal preference. I take these extremes with a grain of salt, as without a lot of experience it's easy to generalize. For example, and I hate to call you out here CryHavoc, but if you don't even know what county Manassas is in, I have to assume you don't know too much about it).

I lived there for a few months and in Fairfax. Its all the same to me. Nice straw man though.

[bornindc]

Originally Posted by cry_havoc

I lived there for a few months and in Fairfax. Its all the same to me. Nice straw man though.

Not arguing with you. I'm glad you are happier now in MD than when you lived those two hellish months in Prince Charles County!