THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Friday, July 21, 1995 TAG: 9507190172
SECTION: CHESAPEAKE CLIPPER PAGE: 16 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Cover Story
SOURCE: BY ELIZABETH THIEL, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: Long : 144 lines
FOUR TIMES A WEEK, Frank J. Giresi and his pals take their lives into their hands.
They set off from Great Bridge Cyclery on Fentress Road and bike along some of the city's most treacherous byways - Centerville Turnpike, Kempsville Road and Battlefield Boulevard among them. They do it for the love of pedaling 20 to 40 miles at a stretch, and the only way to achieve those distances in Chesapeake is to travel some dangerous routes.
The state's fastest-growing city has no real system of trails for people who want to transport themselves by some means other than a car, such as with bicycles, horses or their own two legs.
The few trails that exist or are being installed are in scattered parts of the city, including some parks and private developments. They generally do not connect to each other and to major destinations, such as schools, libraries and shopping centers.
``I'm originally from New York, and I'd rather ride there,'' said Giresi, president of the Tidewater Bicycle Association and a Chesapeake resident. ``There are few places to ride in Chesapeake that are safe. It's very dangerous, especially for children.''
Robert Parker, owner of Great Bridge Cyclery, said the type of development city officials have promoted - huge highways and strip shopping malls - is ``encouraging people to get in the car just to go to the street corner. Nothing they have encourages any kind of pedestrians at all.''
City Planner Mark E. Shea is hoping to change all that, with a plan for a more comprehensive system of trails that would allow people to stride or ride around the city. The trails would range from elaborate paved paths to simple signs posted along existing roadways warning motorists to share with cyclists.
``The whole purpose of the plan is to link the trails together,'' Shea said. ``People aren't going to use little fragments of trails.''
But the 24-page plan, originally drafted last fall by a committee of representatives from cycling, horseback riding, walking and jogging groups, has become mired in controversy. Opponents have criticized its potential cost, with 68 trails proposed as high priority. Some residents who live near proposed trails also have complained about encroachment on their property.
Prompted by those concerns, the Planning Commission sent the committee back to the drawing board and asked Shea to hold public hearings. Three are scheduled - one next week and two in August. Shea said he expects to have a revised plan by late fall.
``Some of my biggest concerns were the costs,'' said Planning Commission member Rodney L. Foster. ``And the second concern was that the people who put the bike plan together didn't include the regular citizens who would be paying for it. They just included citizens who would be using it. So it was kind of one-sided, to me.''
Foster also said there was no evidence that large numbers of residents would use the trails.
But Warren L. Puckett, treasurer of the Tidewater Bicycle Association, who sat on the committee that drafted the plan, said, ``There are thousands of bicycles around here, but you don't see thousands of bicyclists on the roads. Those folks want and need nice, safe, traffic-free places to ride.''
This is not the first time city officials and residents have debated Chesapeake's need for recreational trails.
In 1987, a Southeastern Virginia Planning District Commission study said Chesapeake's trails were well below state standards for a city its size, and recommended a system of 26 recreational paths for Chesapeake. Voters rejected construction of the trails, however, in a 1988 referendum that would have allowed the city to sell $3.4 million in bonds to pay for them. It would have meant a real estate tax increase of 1.3 cents.
City Council, in its 1990 Comprehensive Plan, included the goal of expanding the city's system of recreational paths. But virtually nothing was done to act on that, until city officials began drafting the more recent plan.
``As a taxpayer in Chesapeake, I can understand wanting to control the expenses of the trails, and that unless they're going to be for transportation as well as recreation, it's hard to get city support for spending money on them,'' said R. Michael Fuller, a former president of the Tidewater Striders, a group of runners and walkers that was represented on the committee that drafted the trails plan. Fuller spoke to the Planning Commission in favor of the plan.
Shea said he had no solid estimates of how much the system of trails in his plan would have cost, if the Planning Commission had signed off on it.
His estimates show it could cost between $97,000 and $139,000 per mile to construct a 10-foot-wide paved bike trail, depending upon whether it's laid near an existing road or a special path would have to be cleared.
For a five-foot bike lane on a roadway, it could cost up to $120,000.
But there could be significant cost savings, Shea said, if the city decided not to pave some paths, or elected to construct roadside trails at the same time roads are being widened or expanded.
Shea now says he will tie a revised trails proposal to the city's 20-year plan for improving roads, which would save money and spread out the cost.
Still, Foster says, it's too expensive.
``There are too many needs to be spending money on someone's fun,'' he said.
William ``Bud'' West, president of the Dock Landing Civic League, said that in his neighborhood, it came down to property rights.
Residents of the Dock Landing area wanted some kind of bike trail, he said. But when Shea came out with the plan calling for a trail along Dock Landing Road, homeowners there were horrified. The proposed trail would have taken up most of their yards, and even would have cut into some houses, West said.
``We decided that the price was too high,'' West said.
``I can see the need, the definite need, for bike trails,'' he said. ``But they're going to have to be far better plans than what they presented to us.''
Shea said he hopes to quell such concerns by revising the plan to specify that public hearings would be held before each trail is built. That would mean essentially that the Planning Commission and City Council would be asked just to approve the plan in concept.
``Of course, the areas where people just don't want the trails, we want to hear about it before we go into a lot of costly design,'' Shea said. ILLUSTRATION: [Cover]
[Color Photo]
ROUGH RIDIN'
Staff photos by STEVE EARLEY
A bike rider and truck driver share narrow Dock Landing Road, where
bike trails have met with resistance.
ABOVE: Bike club enthusiasts like April Reth, left, and Frank Giresi
love pedaling 20 to 40 miles at a stretch, but the only way to
achieve those distances in Chesapeake is to travel some dangerous
routes.
RIGHT: William ``Bud'' West, president of the Dock Landing Civic
League, said the original proposed trail would have taken up most of
their yards, and even would have cut into some houses.
EXPRESS YOUR VIEWS
Three public meetings will be held to discuss a proposed plan for
recreational trails in Chesapeake:
July 27, Russell Memorial Library;
Aug. 3, Southeastern Elementary School;
Aug. 17, Indian River Community Center.
All meetings are at 7 p.m. For more information, call the city's
Planning Department at 547-6176.
CHESAPEAKE'S BIKE AND PEDESTRIAN TRAILS
MAP
SOURCE: City of Chesapeake
by CNB