Cedar Rapids, Linn County look to the future of trails, bikeways

Tom Peffer recalls the days in the early 2000s when Linn County bicyclists basically had a couple of graveled trails and then had to ride on streets that had little space reserved for them and their wheels.

But great strides have been made in the past 20 years, said Peffer, president of the nonprofit Linn County Trails Association.

Linn County, Cedar Rapids and Marion now have a little more than 100 miles of hard-surface trails, with planners looking to connect existing trails and add more communities to the trails network.

“It’s just amazing how much progress we’ve made,” Peffer said. “We have to fill in the gaps or it really isn’t a system that flows like it should.”

  Buy Photo

To guide that future work, the city of Cedar Rapids and Linn County Conservation are working on a Trails and Bikeways Plan. And they’re asking the public, local businesses and trail and bikeway enthusiasts to think about the future and what they’d like to see.

The plan will update the city’s and county’s existing trails plans and maps. The city’s plan was adopted in 2012 and the county’s was adopted about 20 years ago.

Trails and bikeways, local leaders believe, help recruit and retain workers, boost the quality of life, draw tourists to the area and attract new businesses.

How to participate

During Bike to Work Week earlier this month, Cedar Rapids staffers shared information and listened to ideas at several events, such as a “handlebar happy hour” at the Sag Wagon, a gathering spot for food and drinks along the trail around Cedar Lake.

Using that input, a plan will be drafted in the coming months and shared with the public for more feedback in the fall, senior Cedar Rapids traffic engineer Ron Griffith said. The updated plan is expected to come to the City Council for consideration by December.

Madison, Wis.-based Toole Design Group and Snyder & Associates are working with the city on the plan and a new trails map will identify locations of planned trails and of amenities such as restrooms, water stations, public art and fitness stations.

“Trails cross municipal boundaries, and so we’re working with Linn County to make sure that the jurisdictions outside of Cedar Rapids can come in and enjoy everything we have to offer, or allowing Cedar Rapidians to go out and explore,” city planner Haley Sevening said.

  Buy Photo

Expanding in the county

In addition to enhancing trails connections to Cedar Rapids, Linn County Conservation officials said their main goal is to better connect smaller communities to the trail system and to county parks.

“We want to make sure that everybody in the county, whether it be within the larger population areas or some of the rural areas, has access to these opportunities, including an accessible trail system,” said Ryan Schlader, county conservation community outreach specialist.

Randy Burke, an outdoor recreation planner for Linn County Conservation, said trail connections are needed in communities such as Springville, Fairfax, Palo, Center Point and Central City.

Work on the Grant Wood Trail, located off Highway 13 near Marion's Waldo's Rock Park, is a key opportunity for the county to expand the trail to the east of the Cedar Rapids metro area and west, potentially into Benton County, Burke said.

“These are parts of the plan that we have looked at over the last 20 years, and we just need to update a plan so that everybody can see what the future is looking at,” Burke said. “We're talking things that could be 20, 25, 30 years out yet because it takes a long time to develop these trails.”

Adding trail connections also would better connect communities to the spine of the 52-mile Cedar Valley Nature Trail. The trail, managed jointly by the Black Hawk and Linn County conservation boards, spans four counties, meandering south from Waterloo and La Porte City into the Cedar Rapids metro area.

The trail was opened in the 1980s, but Linn County Conservation Executive Director Dennis Goemaat said it’s taken four decades to truly complete it and hard-surface most of its length.

Work on the remaining gravel surface will be completed in the coming years, with support from a federally funded Destination Iowa state grant awarded to the Linn and Black Hawk county conservation boards.

The county also is working on the Morgan Creek Trail, going from Morgan Creek Park and following Highway 100 to near Xavier High School. From there, bicyclists can use bike lanes on 42nd Street NE to the Cedar Valley Nature Trail.

Once the ConnectCR project is completed — it will revitalize Cedar Lake and add a pedestrian-bike bridge over the Cedar River between NewBo and Czech Village — that loop will be extended and become a destination, Goemaat said.

“All these loops, the extra connections that you make just make it more enticing for people to come and spend time here,” Goemaat said.

  Buy Photo

CeMar, Cherokee

The Corridor Metropolitan Planning Organization also has boosted support for trails, and now 85 percent of the funding it receives goes toward trail development, according to Griffith, the Cedar Rapids traffic engineer.

That has helped projects such as the CeMar Trail, which connects downtown Cedar Rapids to Uptown Marion. Griffith said the next phase would have the trail going from Council Street to the Cedar Valley Nature Trail, while Marion is working to connect it to the Grant Wood Trail.

Another project underway, the Cherokee Trail, will connect Cherry Hill Park in southwest Cedar Rapids to the county’s Morgan Creek Park. Eventually, the trail will go from Edgewood Road into downtown Cedar Rapids.

Planning the future

Since its last trails plan was adopted in 2012, Cedar Rapids has doubled the miles of trails and added more than 50 miles of new on-street bikeways.

The updated plan needs to be synced with other city master plans — on flood control, climate action and access for those with disabilities, according to Sevening, the Cedar Rapids city planner.

In street projects, too, she said, the city looks to incorporate trails and bikeways, looking for opportunities to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by encouraging bike use and walking.

The work strengthens neighborhood connections and also connections to the surrounding area, Sevening and Griffith said.

“Not everybody has the luxury of having access to a car to get to where they want to go,” Griffith said. “People want the choice of being able to either take a car or take a bike, walk to where they want to go.”

Comments: (319) 398-8494; marissa.payne@thegazette.com