Ponderay trails could define future

(Editors note: This is the third in a series of articles about how local communities have embraced the concept of a connected system of bike and walking paths for both alternative transportation and recreation.)

    PONDERAY – For the past couple of decades, the city of Ponderay has been known more for its ability to attract large names in retail to the highway corridor than for making the community bike and pedestrian friendly.

    Ironically, the widening of U.S. Hwy. 95 will help to change all that. But the recent, multi-million dollar Idaho Transportation Department project is only one of the chips falling Ponderay’s way – once the residential side of town connects to the 1.5-mile Pend d’Oreille Bay Trail along the lake, bikers and walkers will easily be able to navigate their travels in multiple directions.

The ITD project includes a new section of path that intersects with the Sand Creek Byway trail, then continues north along the creek before heading up the bank to the new traffic light at Bonner Mall Way. The crosswalk will lead to a trail along the east side of Hwy. 95, to join existing paths on Kootenai Cutoff Road.

    When the highway upgrades were still in the planning stages, Ponderay’s planning director, Erik Brubaker, pitched hard for the agency to keep non-vehicular traffic in mind.

    “They exceeded our expectations,” he said. “And when this becomes an actual, functioning network, it gets exponentially better.”

    One of the most attractive cogs in this transportation wheel could be Sand Creek. On the map, the sleepy, winding waterway acts as the border between Sandpoint and Ponderay. In reality, it has the potential to become on of the most unique sections in the region’s growing trail system.

    “Our Planning Commission and Parks Committee are interested in looking at Sand Creek as that kind of asset,” said Brubaker. “It’s a no-brainer that it should be a corridor and, amazingly, it has not been developed.”

    Farther south, the ITD-built trail will join the Popsicle Bridge over the creek, making it easy to join the Sandpoint pathway that runs on the east side of Boyer Avenue. Brubaker would like to see the two cities explore the option of a riding and walking loop that hugs both sides of Sand Creek.

    There is, at least philosophically, some support for the idea on Sandpoint’s side of the waterway. Unlike Ponderay, however, the larger of the two municipalities has a long strand of private property to contend with.

    “I like the concept of the loop trail,” said Jared Yost, geographical information systems manager for Sandpoint. “But it’s going to be a difficult path to follow with the property owners on our side, because they have their own, private Idaho right now.”

    Whether it runs on one side or two, an extended Sand Creek trail would travel north to connect to the Schweitzer Cutoff Road west and Kootenai Cutoff Road to the east.

    Ponderay views the trail network as a way to further leverage natural assets and as a connection to its 50-acre, “Field of Dreams” property on the north side of town. When completed, the sports field complex could be one more hub in the city’s trail connectivity plan. By way of example, Brubaker described a scene where a child from Ponderay or Sandpoint could hop on a bike and ride to the fields and back home in safety. Expanding that picture, he discussed a future where the paths would just as easily connect walkers and riders to Ponderay’s business district.

    “All of this is something we will be growing into in a very measured, calculated way,” the planner said.

    The city has no lack of support as it seeks a larger role in the regional trail matrix. The ITD recently selected Ponderay for a Community Choices grant, awarding $233,000 to create bike and pedestrian trails and facilities around the Bonner Mall and adjoining Triangle Drive areas. In addition, Idaho Parks & Recreation and the L.O.R. Foundation each gave $75,000 grants to Ponderay for use in the Pend d’Oreille Bay Trail project.

    “L.O.R. also provided us with $20,000 for the Sand Creek greenbelt and pathways plan,” Brubaker said.

    With a wealth of attractive trail options and the grant funding to make them happen, Ponderay stands to revamp the one-dimensional picture of being just another small town with a highway turned retail district into a multi-textured image of a community that thought big in order to create something memorable.

    A community vision process showed that residents favor that direction, with the majority of them imagining a future where the mix of existing retail is joined by small businesses, restaurants and public spaces situated closer to the lakeshore, all of which is united by a system of trails that make it easy to travel along Lake Pend Oreille or up Sand Creek to enjoy these amenities.

    The sketches that Ponderay residents drew during those planning sessions were later compiled into a series of artist renderings. One of the images shows a family riding together along a waterway. Another depicts residents ice-skating on the frozen lake, with nearby businesses ready to serve them in the background.

One keystone in most of the renderings is a railroad underpass that connects Ponderay to the 4,000 feet of shoreline the city owns on Lake Pend Oreille and the bay trail that connects to pathways in Sandpoint

    “Someday, when we can afford it, an underpass of the railroad tracks makes the Pend d’Oreille Bay Trail part of the network,” Brubaker said. “When we have that underpass, we have the opportunity to bring Kootenai to the party.”

    And at that point, the trail system concept gets another shot in the arm, the planner added, since the Bonner County Historical Society’s property at a former mill site in Kootenai could serve as “a primary trailhead and jumping off point” into to rest of the pathway system.

     “It gives us another way to connect our communities,” Brubaker said. “When we work together – like with these trail projects – we all do better.”

    (In next Sunday’s Daily Bee: How Sandpoint plans to make getting around easier and safer for pedestrians and bicyclists, what those “sharrow” icons on the roads are really all about and how schools, neighborhoods and the downtown core all fit into the regional trail network.)