Several area residents showed up at Tuesday’s meeting of the Crawford County Commission to voice their concerns about a plan to turn an unused railway into a trail.
The commission approved an initial step towards creating the trail, which was proposed by Live Well Crawford County and the Active Transportation Advisory Board, in coordination with Watco Companies, last month.
Crawford County resident Mark Scales said he had not seen any specific plan detailing the trail proposal.
“The only plan that I’ve seen was in your transportation master plan,” Scales said, adding the estimated cost according to that plan was $3.5 million. “And that didn’t include anything for fencing, maintenance, or anything like that.“
Scales said in addition to maintenance, concerns of landowners with property adjacent to the proposed trail site include littering, fire safety, law enforcement, liability, and use of motorcycles and ATVs on the trail.
“So there’s a lot of questions that I know the County Commissioners have asked but haven’t got the answers,” he said.
“I think where we’re at is this is still pretty preliminary, for us and for Live Well,” said Crawford County Counselor Jim Emerson in response to those concerns. “I would expect that there will be a lot more information as they move forward.“
(Read more: Pittsburg, KS – Morning Sun)