Op-Ed: Don't Trade Away Georgetown Pike's Truck Safety Protection

By John Halacy

Nearly 20 years ago, then-Dranesville Supervisor Joan DuBois helped secure a no-through-truck restriction on Georgetown Pike. She understood a simple fact: this narrow, winding rural road in Great Falls was never designed for large commercial trucks.

That protection now appears to be under review.

Citizens for Great Falls has learned that the Great Falls Citizens Association is reportedly discussing a possible trade with VDOT: accept a truck-length restriction at the hazardous curves near Difficult Run—the “S” turns, where VDOT has said tractor-trailers cannot safely navigate — in exchange for lifting the broader through-truck prohibition.

A length restriction at those curves would be a sensible safety measure. But removing the through-truck prohibition in return would create a much larger problem. Georgetown Pike could lose its place in VDOT’s routing advisories and truck restriction maps, which could lead to more trucks using the road as a cut-through between Route 7 and I-495.

Traffic on Georgetown Pike is also different today than it was when the restriction was first proposed. Large trucks are more common, and many dump trucks serving regional construction are larger and heavier than before, including six-axle vehicles built to maximize legal weight capacity. The result is more heavy traffic on roads that were never designed for it.

The safety risk is real. Crashes involving large trucks are far more likely than passenger-car crashes to result in serious injury or death because of the difference in size and weight.

One Citizens for Great Falls board member recently saw that danger firsthand while driving on Georgetown Pike, when an oversized flatbed hauling roof trusses extended beyond the truck’s frame. The member had to slow sharply and pull nearly off the road to avoid a collision, and the load clipped a 35 mph speed-limit sign near Turner Farm. The incident was reported to police.

VDOT’s handling of truck restrictions has also drawn concern. The agency has moved slowly on length limits and has reportedly suggested that any new restriction should be paired with elimination of the through-truck prohibition. That framing risks treating a safety measure as leverage rather than as a separate need. Residents have seen similar resistance before when raising concerns about truck off-tracking on Walker Road’s sharp curves.

To be clear, there is some disagreement about what has actually been discussed. Supervisor Bierman has said no such trade-off came up in his conversations with VDOT, and that those talks focused instead on improvements to the John Adams Bridge over Difficult Run. We take him at his word. Even so, the fact that this idea is circulating should concern anyone who drives Georgetown Pike.

Great Falls residents deserve both protections: a truck-length restriction at the most dangerous curves and the through-truck prohibition that has helped keep this corridor safer for two decades. One should not have to be traded away for the other.

John Halacy is president of Citizens for Great Falls, a community advocacy organization.