Baseball’s trading deadline is July 31, but the District’s transportation scene experienced it’s own version of a pennant race deal yesterday. Now-former head of DDOT Emeka Moneme resigned from his post to take up the Chief Administrative Officer post at Metro. Mayor Fenty can’t be too upset at the loss; WMATA is just returning the favor after Fenty plucked current City Administrator Dan Tangherlini from Metro back in November 2006.

David Alpert has the first definitive swing at wrapping up Moneme’s DDOT tenure, noting that Moneme had his “heart…clearly in the right place,” even if some of his initiatives were less than popular and possibly followed the path of least resistance.

For the time being, the agency’s interim director is Frank Seales Jr., whom no one, including City Paper’s Mike DeBonis, really seems to know much about. His work at DDOT and the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration is all well and good, but it’s not clear he has the type of planning background that the agency needs. Dealing with the plethora of issues that DDOT faces at the moment – which include an ambitious new pedestrian plan and efforts to increase the city’s bicycling reputation with advertising and bikeshare programs – is going to require a hybrid of Moneme’s big ideas and the foresight to see them through effectively.

So where should DDOT go from here?

Photo by volcanojw.