Going forth with a plan

In an ideal world, what would a thorough network of bike lanes, sidewalks and off-road paths throughout Lansing look like?

It was a cold night for bicycling Nov.10, but it was warm inside the northeast corner of Gone Wired Café onthe east side for the unveiling of that vision — Lansing’s completednon-motorized transportation plan.

A familiar cast of bicycling advocates,Public Service Department representatives, 4th Ward City CouncilwomanJessica Yorko and about 15 Lansing-area residents attended theannouncement.

For Yorko, transportation planning forall types of travelers is a policy arena that excites her and for theevent she was also representing the Ingham County Health Department asits environmental justice coordinator.

“Without a tri-county interconnected system, we’d be stuck in Lansing,” Yorko said to the crowd.

A poster of the plan on an easel was theresult of hundreds of planning meetings with residents all over thecity, Yorko said. It’s a detailed network of “on-road facilities” likeexisting bicycle lanes, potential bike lanes and potential connectorroutes through neighborhoods; “off-road facilities” like River Trailaccess points, existing paths and walkways and conceptual shared usepaths; and road crossings that are amenable for walkers and bicycliststo cross and those that need improving.

While places like Aurelius, Miller andPleasant Grove roads, Kalamazoo and Wood streets and Mount Hope Avenuehave on-road bike lanes, the plan is glaringly full of “potentialneighborhood connector routes,” or proposed bike lanes that weavethrough neighborhoods in every ward of the city.

For as much as the non-motorizedtransportation plan does in terms of planning, it’s basically ashowpiece for tangible projects, both completed and ongoing: bike laneson Pleasant Grove and Mount Hope, the River Trail extension south ofMount Hope, planned upgrades to Washington Avenue in REO Town, aforthcoming bike-parking ordinance that would require commercialproperty owners to install bike racks after new construction,improvements to the Saginaw Street bridge, the proposed “sidewalk tonowhere” on the west side and an ongoing inventory of Lansing’ssidewalks. Even the snow and ice removal ordinance and the rain gardensproject along Michigan Avenue fit into the theme of “complete streets.”Other projects — like a Lansing bike-sharing program and a local grantfor building “artistic bike racks”  — are organized separately from the non-motorized plan, but fall in the realm of making the city bike-friendly.

Not unlike the Design Lansing MasterPlan and a five-year Parks and Recreation Plan, the non-motorizedtransportation plan is meant to guide infrastructure planners of wherebicycle and walking routes should be. 

For Chad Gamble, director of the city’sPublic Service Department, following through on these plans is aboutattracting people to the city.

“In an economy like this, it’s thelittle things we have to do to bring people to Lansing,” he said to thegroup. “It’s the little things that create a sense of place.”

Technically, the non-motorized plan isn’t complete.

“We’ll update it as people havesuggestions and projects,” said Andy Kilpatrick, a transportationengineer with the city’s Public Service Department. “There’s no reasonwe can’t keep adding things.”

Gamble agrees: “This type of plan isnever complete. On paper, it represents a comprehensive plan futureChad Gambles will be able to utilize when rebuilding certain sectionsof the city.”

So far, the goal of getting Lansingresidents more active seems to be working. On Nov. 10, Janine Sinno, ahealth analyst with the Ingham Co. Health Department, awarded the citya “Promoting Active Communities Award” — one of 28 communities awardedin the state this year, she said.

Much of the formal non-motorizedplanning kicked off in 2009 after the City Council adopted its CompleteStreets ordinance. Yorko hadn’t been elected by that time and was onthe side of advocating for the legislation.

The Tri-County Regional PlanningCommission landed a $3 million grant from the U.S. Department ofHousing and Urban Development Monday, and part of that will go intoplanning which projects ought to be done next within the city, said BobJohnson, Lansing’s director of planning and neighborhood development.“I view it as very important,” Johnson said of the grant, adding thatgrant money will not go toward actual construction.

As for the millage increase passed Nov.8 — which is expected to generate about $2 million for local roads —Gamble said that money will be used “for more emergency-type work.”

John Lindenmayer, who was representingthe Walk and Bike Task Force on Nov. 10 but also works for the Leagueof Michigan Bicyclists, pointed to 2006 when the task force formed andset out to answer the question: What can be done to make Lansing moreamenable to bicyclists?

The result was a “76-point strategic plan” document and “a lot got incorporated in the non-motorized plan.”

Lindenmayer said with projects completedand in the works, the non-motorized plan is important because “we’veall been waiting for an official plan. It’s the next step for gettingthe infrastructure in place.”

Lansing now joins communities like Ann Arbor, Kalamazoo, Battle Creek, Detroit and Mt. Pleasant with non-motorized plans. 

Yorko said the non-motorized plan was“probably the most heavily inputted infrastructure plan” designed forthe city, compiled through “thousands of assessments” and about 120meetings of the Lansing Walk and Bike Task Force since 2009. She turnedto Kilpatrick, of the Public Service Department, to confirm that.

“I think so,” Kilpatrick responded. “There will probably still be people who will say they didn’t know about it.”

See it

The city’s completed non-motorized transportation plan can be viewed at
www.tinyurl.com/6t5t9zx