At the February 24 Mayor & Council meeting, we voted to award the bid for the first part of the Maple Ave sidewalk project. It wasn’t a contested vote, but it’s a good opportunity for me to talk about sidewalks. We have several sidewalk projects in various stages in Brunswick right now, and I’ll try to break them down in layman’s terms here to the best of my knowledge.
Planned Projects
The project that’s farthest along is for the lower part of North Maple Ave, from B St to F St. It’s to build new sidewalks to fill gaps, replace existing sidewalks that are in bad condition, and create crosswalks for the side streets and the intersections of Maple Ave with B St and E St. This is the bid award we approved on Feb. 24, and City Hall will conclude a contract with the construction company soon if they haven’t already done so. The cost of the project is expected to be roughly $360,000 (including the already-completed design), but it is entirely funded through a federal grant called the Community Development Block Grant (CDBG). The plan is for construction to start this month and to be complete by June 30—though the start date in particular could change if there’s a delay in getting a contract sorted out.
The next project is for the East H St from Souder Road to Second Ave. We voted to award the bid for its design at the February 10 council meeting. The design cost came out to approximately $415,000, and construction will be more, but this project is also grant funded—in this case, from a grant intended to support safe routes for kids to get to school. The design phase is going to take about a year, and construction will tentatively begin next summer (2027).
After that, the next project lined up is to finish North Maple Ave from F St to Souder Road. This section will also be funded through the federal CDBG grant program, but in smaller annual amounts. Depending on what the project ends up costing, it may need to be done in two parts (for example, F St to Wenner Drive first, then Wenner Drive to Souder Road second). The plan is for the design work to start in 2027, so the earliest we would see construction would be 2028. It could take until 2030 or so before it is fully finished.
Steady progress is the key.
Those are the major City-run projects in the pipeline right now, but they aren’t the only ones going on. As part of Brunswick’s annexation agreements related to the Vista Pointe and Springdale Summit (Cooper Farm) developments, the developers of those properties committed to build some public sidewalks as well. The timing will depend on how long it takes for the developments to get built out, but it’s a good bet they’ll take shape between now and 2030.
The Springdale developers will build a pedestrian and bike path along the perimeter of the development on north side of MD Route 464 from Frazer Road to the 9th Ave intersection and the north side of Souder Road from the 9th Ave intersection to the end of their property near the intersection with 2nd Ave. If the City or the State Highway Administration is able to work out right-of-way and easements with the other property owners near the 2nd Ave intersection, the developer will build or contribute to the construction of a crosswalk there that connects the new pedestrian path to the existing sidewalk between 2nd Ave and the shopping center.
On the other side of town, the Vista Pointe developers are planning a sidewalk in coordination with the City that will connect West Potomac Street to Brunswick Street by cutting diagonally from Werntz Alley to the West End Playground, there linking up with the Valley Trail path that goes to Brunswick Crossing. They are also planning to build a sidewalk that connects the West End Playground to the existing sidewalk on Brunswick Street across from the Dollar General.
You can see some of the design drawings for the lower part of N. Maple Ave here.
You can see the approved bid for the design of the H St project here (pages 75-101).
And the approved bid for construction of the lower N. Maple Ave project is here (pages 26-43).
Projects I’d Like to See in Future Years
So, there are a lot of sidewalk projects going on over the next four years, which is good. There is still a lot more of Brunswick that needs sidewalks, though. Although it is unlikely that other major sidewalks will be built during my four-year term, I want to help plant the seeds of future projects while I’m in a position to influence City priorities. After all, many of the projects getting built now started being planned before my time on the City Council. As temporary public servants, we often start things that don’t become concrete (literally) until we’re out of office.
I think the next priority areas for new sidewalk construction should be:
1. 2nd Ave, especially the section between H St and Souder Road.
2. The “High School Hill Corridor,” by which I mean repairing the existing sidewalk on 4th Ave (the steep section between A St and D St where the old high school used to be) and connecting it to H St via 5th and/or 6th Ave.
Both of those stretches would connect the sidewalk network further downtown to the sidewalks being built in the near-term (H St and Souder Road), serve the big middle part of Brunswick that has very few sidewalks now, and make it safer for the kids who walk through that part of town to get to the middle school and high school.
Now, as you can see, building sidewalks isn’t cheap. That’s partly because nothing is cheap these days and partly because there are lots of specifications—either coming from regulation or grant requirements—as to exactly how we have to build a sidewalk. Some seem excessive, but others make sense. That’s because in a public right-of-way there’s never anything as simple as just building a sidewalk: You’re also considering all of the things next to, over, or under it, like utility lines and streetlights and stormwater drainage systems. In a hilly town like Brunswick, there’s also often a lot of re-grading that has to be done.
Because of the cost, making progress on sidewalks is slow, but we’re doing it. We’ve set aside annual revenue from the CDBG grant program and the City’s system improvement fee to make sure we can keep chipping away at both major new sidewalk construction and smaller sidewalk repair projects.
Repairing Sidewalks
Sidewalk repair is a more difficult subject. Under Brunswick’s ordinances, repairing sidewalks is the legal responsibility of the owner of the adjacent property, and that’s the norm for much of Maryland. I’ve talked to people who don’t want sidewalks built next to their homes for that reason: They don’t want to be on the hook someday for fixing them.
I think private homeowner responsibility for maintenance of public sidewalks works poorly in practice, and that, long-term, the only effective way to keep Brunswick’s sidewalks in good repair will be for the City to take on responsibility for the replacement of sidewalks worn out through ordinary wear and tear. However, the time isn’t ripe for that now. There are a lot of sidewalks in poor condition in Brunswick, and the cost of repairing them all could run into the tens of millions of dollars, which could require a substantial property tax hike. Instead, the City has a policy of identifying the worst stretches and using certain funding sources (namely, grants and the system improvement fee) to repair them. There are several areas around town where small projects of this sort could take place, though it will take some time to work through them.
Where the City makes targeted repairs or adds new sidewalks, residents shouldn’t have to worry about the sidewalk next to them deteriorating for several years, so long as you’re not parking your truck on it (if you do park your truck on it, I reckon the repair should very much be your responsibility). Whenever the City controls sidewalk contracts (i.e., not along state roads), I’ll scrutinize them to the best of my ability—as I’m sure my colleagues will too—to make sure the work is being done by trusted engineers and builders. I know it’s not the most satisfying answer at the moment, but if Brunswick can gradually get our sidewalk network in better shape, the barriers to reconsidering how we maintain it will get lower.
Steady progress is the key. I’m glad to vote to approve multiple sidewalk projects right now, I’m looking forward to seeing them start, and I’ll be looking for opportunities to get the ball rolling on more.
Code of ordinances (Section 3-2202, page 37).
The resolution that established the current City sidewalk replacement program (page 2).
An official explainer of the City’s sidewalk replacement program, showing how it was applied in the sidewalk project on the West End that was finished in 2024.