LAKEPORT >> The Lake County/City Area Planning Council (APC) is currently in the process of updating the Regional Transportation Plan to identify transportation needs and priority projects over the next 20 years.
Some projects the APC are planning to have in their update are better sidewalks and bike paths, parts of Highway 29 and extending roads like the Dam Road Extension in Clearlake to better connect them with shopping marts and housing.
“Everyone wants improvements, but there’s not always enough dollars to go around,” APC Senior Planner John Specka said.
Measures “V” and “Z” that were passed in the 2016 election will help with creating more revenue in the budget for projects that are incorporated in the Regional Transportation Plan, Specka added. The budget for transportation projects has gradually decreased over the years, so the passing Measures will play a huge roll in making repairs happen.
“The Measures are huge victories for repairs,” Specka said. “We don’t need to wait on the state to give money for the projects.”
Phil Dow, Executive Director of Dow & Associates and Senior Transportation Planner for the APC said every grant they apply for needs to meet certain standards, such as the ability to identify there was a public meeting about it, comments for them public and how many people came. This gives more emphasis on the public input on what they need he added.
“We don’t want to be surprised either, we want to know what your concerns are early on in the (planning) process,” Dow said.
Jeff Cramer, owner of the Main St. Bicycles in Downtown Lakeport said he has gone to a previous APC meeting and voiced his concerns with bike paths.
“I’ve been trying to acquire a safer bike path for kids to ride their bikes to school,” Cramer said. “It’s disconcerting to me when parents talk about their kids not getting enough exercise.”
Cramer said he will be attending one of the workshops to voice his input for better bike paths to clear up the roads to schools, and get more kids to ride their bikes.
“Parents are part of the problem, we go and drive our kids to school because of how unsafe it is to walk or ride a bike and just add to the issue,” Cramer said.
Lori Holmes, a School Board Member in Lake County, said she is very happy with the Hartley Street Safe Route to School Project that was approved.
“The congestion of traffic on taking kids to school is very unsafe, especially to those who are riding their bikes or walking to school,” she pointed out.
Other issues that have come up are getting out of county transportation for people who are referred to specialist, Karl Turner mobility programs coordinator for Lake County Transit said.
“The demographics of who is riding the bus is different than that of other places like San Francisco, Turner said. “ I am currently in the progress of working on a grant to help the process for people to get out of county medical transportation.”
APC will host a series of public workshops for the community to give them a chance to voice their concerns or say what they would like to see changed in regards of transportation issues. This will allow those who are interested a chance to have their input in the plan.
The APC updates the plan every four years, however there has not been an update since 2010 because of a housing cycle update and the need to keep the two plans in sync. Specka said this is to keep the transit projects and housing projects synced together and up to date.
Other workshops will be held in Middletown, Lucerne and Clearlake.
