Charles Horner, 64, a retired neighbor who with Zitzman tries to keep the road clear, moved in about the same time. They say the developer's promises to improve the road were not carried out.
"It was more or less a handshake and good will," Horner said. Their developer, one of three who prepared the lots for sale, said he would build a better road when three lots sold. He never did.
The subdivision backs up to Patapsco State Park, off a dead-end section of Henryton Road that once led to the old Henryton State Hospital in Carroll County. Tropical Storm Agnes cut the road in 1972 by washing out the bridge across the Patapsco River.
Collier can watch deer feeding from the large windows in an addition that serves as her office. She loves the place, she said, except for the road - the only way in and out. Residents' efforts over the past two decades to improve the road have failed, she and neighbors said.
Horner said paving the road on their own without making it a public road would create new problems because maintaining a paved road would be much more costly than dumping more crushed stone, as is now done.
As time has passed and residents age, it's become harder each year to get unanimous agreement on anything, he said. Meanwhile, worries grow about emergency access.
"What if my husband had a heart attack?" Collier said.
Horner said a neighbor's child had an epileptic seizure during an icy spell and her parents had to put her in the car and take her down to the paved road for pickup by an emergency vehicle.
Members of the group attended Howard County Executive Ken Ulman's annual town meeting in Ellicott City on July 8 to ask for help from the county, but they got no promises.
Collier said her group wants the county to change the rule that requires unanimous consent to make a private road public. But Collier said she believes that if the price could be reduced, she could get all 20 residents to agree.
County officials are sympathetic, but are fearful of setting a precedent.
"There are spots like that all over Howard County," said James Irvin, the county's public works director. "It's a tough question."
