Reply With QuoteI think a bike path would be great. I would love to be able to ride my bike along the lake or even just go their for a walk with my dog. I hope it goes through.
Hamburg bike trail hinges on board consensus
By Elmer Ploetz NEWS STAFF REPORTER
Updated: 04/28/08 1:36 PM
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Hamburg Town Councilwoman Joan Kesner says she knows what she needs to keep the Hoover Beach-area bike trail plan alive: support from the Town Board.
“The bottom line is the state will not give us our extension until they know we are all on the same page, in favor of the bike trail,” said Kesner.
The extension would be on a deadline to have begun work on the project in order to retain a $243,000 state grant. Officials could not say exactly when the deadline is.
The need for consensus was one reason Kesner asked for discussion of the trail to be moved from a Town Board work session last week to a session next Monday. Councilman Tom Best Sr., one of the most outspoken skeptics of the trail plan, was going to be out of town for last Monday’s meeting.
The project was supposed to be done by now, but red-tape delays kept pushing the work back, and costs rose by about $100,000, Kesner said.
Some residents in the Hoover Beach area started voicing objections to the trail earlier this year, but next Monday’s meeting will not be a public forum on the trail.
“Generally there’s no public comment at a work session; it’s the Town Board discussing things,” said Supervisor Steven Walters. “But certainly the public is welcome to come. It’s an open meeting.”
Walters said he welcomes the meeting as an opportunity to dig into the information about the trail, which was past the planning stages by the time he took office two years ago.
“We want to sit down and just get all the facts on the table. There are some incorrect perceptions on the bike path, I think, by everyone,” he said. “We’ve never had a chance to do that, to sit down and dig deep into this whole bike path plan. Hopefully once that happens, we’ll have a better sense of direction.”
Joe Kilian, one of the founders of the bike path effort, hopes to help guide that direction. He said he has more than 1,400 signatures on petitions supporting the trail. He said he’s suggesting people write letters to Walters and the Town Board if they support it.
The trail head — a parking lot near the Dock of the Bay restaurant — has already been built.
The Penn Dixie natural history site has done renovations preparing for the extension of the trail, which is projected as part of a series of trails extending from the Buffalo waterfront to Evangola State Park.
The Lackawanna City Council has also passed a resolution urging Hamburg to complete the trail, which would extend into that city.
Kesner said if Hamburg drops its plans it could also endanger grants of $250,000 for work on the former Foit’s Restaurant site on the lake and $300,000 for traffic calming on Route 5.
I think a bike path would be great. I would love to be able to ride my bike along the lake or even just go their for a walk with my dog. I hope it goes through.
Ability is what you're capable of doing. Motivation determines what you can do. Attitude determines how well you can do it. - Lou Holtz
make The Trail Wide Enough To Fit A Paved Bike Path And A Snowmobile Trail Parellel To Each Other All The Way To The Waterfront!!!!!!
Sorry, what??Originally Posted by Sylvan
Cut the trail wide enough...
Summer: paved path for walking, skating, biking.
Winter: Skiing on one side of the pavement and snowmobiling [safely] off to the other side.
See? If you're going to cut a path in Hamburg that leads to the waterfront AND through Lackawanna to The Outer Harbor and maybe Erie Basin Marina/HSBC Arena, cut a path that is multifuctional.
I would imagine that would cost the Hamburg taxpayers way too much money, add costs to widen the path and bother the residents who would have to listen to snowmobiles drive past there house.
What a bunch of sissies.
Snowmobiling brings business.
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