Published: June 25, 2008 05:38 pm            

FLASHPOINT: Communities should say ‘no thanks’ to state’s trail plan

You have dutifully and respectfully published the state’s publicity release announcing its forthcoming imposition of another chapter in its grandiose statewide trails plan. We are supposed to be delighted because “the state” is going to give us even more unrequested public trails which will invade and intrude upon our local and rural neighborhoods.

“The state” plans its trail initiatives as though our current networks of roads, streets, bridges, sidewalks, railroad routes and parks are already adequately developed, maintained and paid for but (shame on us) not really what we have wanted or needed.

As announced “the state” plans to make “one-time distributions” to us to pay for only the certain more “linear parks” throughout our countryside. “Linear parks” of course is a euphemism for abhorrent strip zoning affording an uncontrolled public free access to the unguarded facets of our private property with boundary lines as long as may be conceivably possible.

If our local government accepts this “generosity” the state will be paying only the seed money for the new trails. Who will reimburse local government for the man-hours required to partner with the state? Who will pay for correcting the flaws in “the plan” and for repairing or maintaining the trails in the years ahead? Who will pay for cleaning up the inevitable trash and filth contributed by the intended and unintended users of the trails? Who will reverse the despicable graffiti which will become ubiquitous? Who will pay for policing criminal conduct on the trails? Can it be done?

How will we stop the secluded trails from evolving into smuggler’s lanes accommodating the needs of those who manufacture and distribute meth and other drugs? How long will the criminals be fooled by fake or dummy surveillance cameras? Who will pay for the insurance required to protect us from civil liability for all of the aberrant ways pedestrians will be abused by joggers, and joggers will be treated by bikers, and bikers will be treated by four-wheelers, and on and on, accidentally and intentionally.

My father as an aging member of an unsuspecting group of walkers was killed by an idiot biker who felt he would be given the right-of-way by the group of seniors. It happens!

We will pay for the increases in insurance premiums all neighbors along the trail will pay to cover the many kinds of loss and liability risks inflicted in person and property by both well-intentioned and criminal strangers to our location? Right now we exist in relative safety by knowing each other and being alert to strangers. That form of safety will become a thing of the past.

Who will reimburse the many neighbors who will suffer from loss of value for their property. In years passed I served as president of Parke County’s Board of Zoning Appeals. I know such loses can occur. I also know I would not personally pay full value (undiscounted) for a property along a trail in rural Vigo County. The “linear park” is not a golf course, after all.

Who will compensate us for the new fears we will experience and have to live with after a couple of the good people are raped or battered by a couple of the bad people using the trail for access or cover? The exodus of neighbors will be measurable, and reduced usage of the trail will be dramatic, to a level approaching abandonment.

My family is personally blessed with a piece of rural Indiana served by county roads we all wanted and paid for. Nevertheless prudent women in our family do not now search even for mushrooms in our woodlands without carrying a weapon. Spring and fall festival traffic on our county roads as well as the consistent tone of headlines in your newspaper tell us why self-defense is so essential. Trail traffic would make it almost impossible.

I will close by quoting from a recently published “Think Tank” Cato letter: “Government officials claim their plans will help us live happier lives. But planners’ predictions of the future are no better than anyone else’s, so their plans will always be flawed and those flaws lead to more grief and pain than joy.

“Everybody plans. We plan our workdays, we plan our careers, we plan for retirement. But private plans are flexible and we happily change them when new information arises. In contrast, as soon as a government plan is written, people who benefit from the plan form special interest groups to ensure that the plan does not change, no matter how costly it proves to be to society as a whole.”

In the case of the state’s trails plan, we cannot afford it, we did not ask for it, we do not need it, and it is replete with flawed assumptions and concepts.

If you like where you live and love the outdoors, be careful what you wish for. Being more than 15 minutes from a “linear park” means it is more than 15 minutes from you, and that is not all bad. In my opinion we should urge all government officials in our area to say “thanks, but no thanks!” to the pending “linear park” offer. We can instead make better use of the capacity we already have, if needed.

— Merrill S. Thompson

Bridgeton

        

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