Metrobus on14th St & Colorado Ave NW, D.C. (7News/File)
HILLCREST HEIGHTS, Md. (7News) — After about a half-century of providing bus service inside the Forest Hill Apartments complex in the Hillcrest Heights area near the D.C. line, Metro said it will stop running buses through the community this weekend after a cease-and-desist letter from the complex’s lawyers.
Starting Sunday, in addition to no longer running through the Forest Hill complex, Metrobus’ P12 route will no longer stop on Wheeler Hills Road, where buses pick up residents at the Homes at Oxon Hill senior apartment complex. However, residents of that community and Forest Hill Apartments will still be able to catch P12 buses on nearby Southern Avenue.
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Metro said it’s eliminating the stops for the senior community on Wheeler Hills Road because it no longer has a direct route through Forest Hill Apartments to get to them.
Based on walking directions provided by Google Maps, it appears the most affected residents of the two communities will walk about a fifth mile longer than the one they currently have to make. For many residents, the extra walk will be shorter than that.
However, not only will the walk be longer for residents of the senior community, but it will be more difficult. Instead of an easy walk through the parking lot to the bus stop, residents -- many of whom use canes -- will in most cases have to navigate down steps to catch the bus on busy Southern Avenue.
“This is a 62 and older property," said Rhonda Proctor, the community manager for the Homes at Oxon Hill. "They don’t want to go outside anyway, and then to have to walk all the way down and catch the bus, it’s hard for them.”
“It greatly affects me, because when I do go to work and I come home I like to take the P12 because it drops me off right here," said Homes at Oxon Hill resident Denice Lacey, who added that she was concerned about safety: "Especially at night. Because if you’re coming off Southern Avenue, it’s a lot of traffic...Southern Avenue is not good late at night.”
This week, Metro released a Nov. 25, 2024, cease-and-desist letter sent by a law firm representing Forest Hill Apartments that threatened a lawsuit against Metro if it did not stop running buses on the apartment complex’s property.
“Although Forest Hill Apartments did not initially object because the route benefited the residents of the Property, the heavy buses have been significantly impacting and damaging the asphalt road on the Property,” Elliott Engel of the law firm Berman, Boyle, & Engel wrote in the letter. “But despite multiple conversations, WMATA has refused to repair the damages to the roads. Accordingly, permission to use the private road of the Forest Hill Apartments is hereby revoked.”
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Metro did not comment Thursday on the accusation that its buses were damaging the property’s roads.
The transit agency said it is rerouting P12 buses because of the demands made in the letter, impacting roughly 150 riders each weekday.
Metro said riders can continue to board P12 buses at the following locations near the communities: