On Thursday, Nov. 15th, the Puget Neighborhood
Association held a general membership meeting to discuss neighborhood trails as
well as up and coming department projects with James King, the director of
Parks and Recreation.
“Trails are used by many, many
people in our neighborhood,” said Mary Chaney, president of the Puget
Neighborhood Association. “I thought the
meeting went really well. People came
because they were interested in parks and trails in particular.”
King began the meeting with a
presentation on Parks and Recreation projects then opened the floor to
facilitate discussion of neighborhood concerns.
During the meeting, many of the 26 neighbors present asked questions
(both of King and each other), discussed which trails are and aren’t marked,
and even drew unmarked, poorly maintained, or proposed trails on one of the
large neighborhood base maps printed out.
“It [the meeting] helped the
neighbors understand what the department is doing, and it helped me understand
what projects they thought were important,” King said.
Three primary areas of concern
emerged from the neighbors’ discussion: trail marking, trail upkeep, and trail
development.
Trail Marking
“We in the
neighborhood would like to have greater clarity as to where the trails are,”
Chaney said just before the neighborhood meeting. “Most park trails that are clearly used a lot
are identified by those wooden posts with a couple of golden yellow bands
around them, but we don’t have them everywhere.
There are lots of trails that have no markings at all.”
Throughout
the meeting, neighbors were able to discuss which trails had markers, and which
were in need of an identifier.
“From
Racine, there’s a trail right-of-way that borders on private property,” said
one of Puget’s neighbors. She discussed
the small easement winding from Racine’s upper block down to Edwards Court, and
how the easement was hard to identify from Racine due to its lack of
marking. From Racine, the easement
appears to be part of an empty lot that is private property – and while the
private lot is clearly marked, the small right-of-way is not.
Another
neighbor explained that a few of the easements on Puget Hill looked more like
yards than trails because they were not clearly marked.
“They [Puget neighbors] want more
trail signs,” said King when asked about the neighborhood’s primary
concerns. “We [the department] are
looking to see if signs can be installed.”
One man asked King if it would be
possible to put signs up on trails that were already marked on Puget’s base map
without having to investigate who owned the trail, and King said it would be
possible.
“I am happy to go back and talk to
staff and look at these things,” King said.
“I would encourage working with us and getting a clearing, and if it’s
as simple as putting in the little posts that shows it’s a trail, it’s not that
big of a deal.”
Chaney plans on following up with
King concerning the trails come the new year.
“I plan to wait until January as
James King suggested when the budget process is over,” Chaney said. “Then I will contact Mr. King and hopefully
develop a modest plan to move forward on getting markers for more of our trails.”
Trail Upkeep
A second
concern shared by Puget neighbors was the accessibility of many neighborhood
trails.
“A lot of
the easements aren’t very passable,” one neighbor said. “There’s one coming south from Racine and
that goes to Edwards Court. As you’re
going down to Edwards Court, it’s real steep, it’s very narrow, it’s real
slick, it’s leaf-covered, and it’s supposed to be a pathway. When I was coming down there, I was scared
for my life.”
Another man
said the right-of-way connecting 45th (just off Consolidation) and
Nevada Street was “downhill, pretty steep, and pretty muddy.”
Chaney asked if it would be possible to use
some of the neighborhood budget and some of the neighborhood’s “people power”
to help mark and clear the trails, and King said he would be happy to take Puget
up on that offer.
“Staff will
be looking at the locations that were identified on the map for possible
signage and trail improvements,” King said.
“If some
one or some of us will lead the work, I think people will help,” said
Chaney. “It is the leadership that is
always hard to get going.”
Trail Development
The
neighbors discussed the possibility of a trail linking Puget Street with the Lincoln
Street, either at the Lakeway shopping center or at the Lincoln Creek Park ‘N
Ride.
“Connecting
Consolidation right on down to Lincoln Street… You got the park and ride lot
and it would make a logical way for people to come off of Lincoln Street, up
the hill, and connect on that Samish trail,” one neighbor said.
Another
neighbor discussed the convenience of a cross-connection between Puget and
Lincoln. Due to the lack of east-west
connections in Puget, neighbors currently have to walk down the entire hill to
Lakeway Drive if they wish to reach Lincoln Street or the Lakeway shopping
center.
Safety of
walkers also played into the discussion of this particular cross-connection.
“Puget is
awful,” said Chaney. “It’s our secondary
arterial, and it’s asphalt, fog line, then kkkkrrrrrk [sudden noise signaling the
ditch bordering the road].” The sidewalk
ends about a quarter of a way up this street, after which the fog line borders
ditch, forcing pedestrians to walk in the road itself.
“We are
looking into that option,” King said when asked about the likelihood of the
cross-connector linking upper Puget with Lincoln Street. “We will continue to work with them [the
Puget neighbors].”
“I think all of us in attendance
learned more,” said Mary Chaney, president of the Puget Neighborhood
Association. “The neighbors learned more
about the trails and what might be possible to do. And James King learned about some of our
trails that he did not know about and that Puget is highly interested in
trails.”
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