Attendance was good at tonight’s City-Wide Trails plan update. If you missed this one, there is still one more on Thursday at the Shoal Creek police station. Here are the highlights.
256 miles of trails are planned for key city-wide corridors. 90% are multi-use trails and 10% are on-street bike routes. Several high-priority segments are already funded for over the next five years, including…
- Brush Creek Trail – closing gaps between the Plaza and the Blue River
- Indian Creek – extension east to the Blue River
- Downtown/Plaza route – new on-street bike route connecting the Trolley Track and Riverfront Heritage Trails.
- Southern Platte Pass (NW 64th) – extension eastward under I-29.
- Hwy 152 – new trail between N. Amity and Green Hills Road
- I-29 – new trail between Hwy 152 and Tiffany Springs Parkway
The Trails Plan web site has a couple of maps that show the city-wide network (PDF), as well as the segments with funding (PDF) in the next five years. Those maps are from December 2007, but they are pretty close to the final versions presented tonight.
But most of the plan still needs a funding source. The planning team is looking for ways to use existing resoures like in-house engineers, landscape architects, construction crews, etc. – but ultimately some new money will need to come from somewhere. That means either moving money from elsewhere in the city budget or bringing in new revenue. Options for new revenue include everything from a city property tax to a regional sales tax.
