Accordingly, people in Takoma Park opposed the North Central Freeway, even with the B&O railroad route as proposed in November 1962, because it would displace a row of houses.Indeed, this was so with both the 1966 and 1971 B&O route North Central Freeway proposals. Although the 1966 plan included a set of 3 lane tunnels alongside the railroad further to the north at the vicinity of Montgomery Community College and Blair Park, it transitions to an open depressed and then elevated along the elevated portion of the railroad where the topography falls back in the Takoma Station area, with 3 lanes on each side of the railroad. This avoids the Cady Lee Mansion, but it relocates Takoma Avenue displacing the adjoining Victorian houses. The 1971 plan replaces this with a 6 lane tunnel on the railroad's east side; this displaces the Cady Lee Mansion, with the open trench portion to the north relocating Takoma Avenue and displacing those houses.
A design with 3 or even 4 lanes on each side of the railroad as cut and cover tunnels would have preserved all of these houses, with Takoma Avenue reconstructed in its existing location atop the northbound cut and cover tunnel.
Why then was not such a plan ever drawn up?
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