Pedestrian-Bicycle task force releases proposed recommendations, asks for more funding, organization for accessibility issues

George Moise, 3, of Lawrence, rides his big-wheel tricycle near Eighth and Louisiana streets as his grandfather, Bill Brock of Des Moines, Iowa, walks behind, April 4, 2015.

A task force that has been dedicated for the past eight months to looking into Lawrence’s pedestrian and bicycle issues made public a draft of its final recommendations for how the city’s accessibility could improve.

In a 37-page document, the 11-member Pedestrian-Bicycle Issues Task Force outlined problems for pedestrians and bicyclists in Lawrence, including gaps in sidewalks, broken sidewalks, unconnected bicycle paths and a fragmented network of organizations that advise the city on pedestrian and bicycle issues.

“We looked at all of the major issues surrounding pedestrian/bicycle facilities, including everything from kids getting to school to people who don’t drive getting to work,” said Marilyn Hull, who chaired the task force. “We were trying to really get a handle on a whole bunch of issues that the Commission was hearing about but wasn’t thinking through very systematically. We tried to do that homework for them.”

Among the task force’s recommendations for what to accomplish by 2030 is to ask voters for a 0.05 percent sales tax increase to fund sidewalk repairs.

The group estimated a 0.05 percent increase would generate $850,000 per year, providing the city the funding to bring public sidewalks and curb ramps to ADA compliance by the 2030 target.

City policy currently requires property owners to maintain sidewalks — a law the task force called “politically unenforceable.”

The estimated cost of the city repairing damaged sidewalks and bringing them to ADA compliance is $9.5 million, according to the task force’s draft report.

“Here’s what I think: I think there’s a lot of community support for improving our sidewalks,” Hull said. “Nobody wants to see their taxes increase. It’s going to be a challenging conversation, but we wanted to include that in our presentation as one option that the City Commission could consider.”

The report states Lawrence has 72 miles of streets that do not have sidewalks on either side. The task force estimated it would cost $10.5 million to create sidewalks on one side of every street in the city and $118.7 million to install sidewalk on both sides of every street.

The 2016 to 2018 Capital Improvement Plan calls for spending $1.5 million to fill in sidewalk gaps.

One of the task force’s recommendations is to have the city allocate 0.05 percent of the infrastructure sales tax to improvement projects for pedestrians and bicyclists that aren’t connected to a street improvement.

The task force also wants city staff and a commission dedicated to pedestrian and bicycle issues.

Hull said the task force was assembled nearly one year ago after multiple groups lobbied City Hall for funding and improvements for pedestrians and bicyclists.

A new transportation commission, she said, would take into consideration all modes of transportation and “make the investments that are the smartest for the community overall.”

“One of the things that we learned through our study is there was not really a holistic approach to advising the commission on bike and pedestrian-related issues,” Hull said.

The task force gathered input from the public to create the recommendations. It’s now asking that the public weigh in again on its draft report.

A survey about the recommendations was posted through the city’s Lawrence Listens forum, and the task force is hosting a public meeting about them on Feb. 3 at 5:45 p.m. at City Hall, 6 E. Sixth St.

The task force will present and talk about the recommendations with the City Commission during a study session at 4 p.m. Feb. 9, also at City Hall.

The task force’s deadline to submit its final report is March 1.

Hull said she didn’t think the City Commission would vote on the report as a package. Instead, she said, the recommendations will be considered over time.

“It will be a series of decisions over time, I think,” Hull said. “Some are budget related, some are policy related and some are staffing related. It will take time for the city to work through all of those.”