There has been a silent battle brewing for the past month or so when the city announced it had plans to cut down a bunch of trees to make way for a new bike path. At the time of the news it wasn't very clear which trees on 30th street they were talking about but now thanks to a Save the Trees 2121 and a recent article at the daily camera it is much more clear. It appears that a bike path is planned to run along the ditch that runs behind Target and on to 30th street and under it is being planned (see photo below). This means many of the existing trees will get chopped.
The current land owner is worried that she will lose a friend and the magic of her land which the city is willing to pay for (not sure if it will cover friendship or the magic part). Another complaint is that the proposed trail will go no where, simply under 30th street and that's it. City officials are claiming this is part of a larger plan that will extend to the new train depot... but no plans are currently public.
Watch this video at CBS
Would this be making any headlines if it were a new street instead of a bike path?
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There's a lot to this story
There's a lot to this story that's not getting reported.
The bridge that currently goes over the creek/waterway needs to be replaced. If it doesn't, it will fail.
The way the city is funding the repair is to tap into money that pays to expand bike paths. If the city does not use this federal money to fix the bridge and expand the bike path, then when the bridge fails, the city will have to raise the money from other (presumably non-federal) sources, such as sidewalk repairs, other money for bike paths, RTD subsidies, etc.
What a lot of folks also don't take into consideration is that the whole area around 30th and Pearl are undergoing massive changes in the next 5-10 years. The Transit Village will be there, and will affect all kinds of things. Those trees may not even last past the next landlord, once the land goes up in price, gets sold, and is worth more without the trees.
As is usually the case, there's more to the story than just what's in the headline or 2 minute video segment.
Thanks for posting this. I hope more people can learn all the sides of the issues, and make some informed calls to those in charge to express their concerns, and not just what they heard...
Got some free time.. read the comments at the daily camera..
http://www.dailycamera.com/news/2009/jul/08/boulder-city-revisits-plans-...