Love walking/running in parks? ‘Soft Surface Trails Plan’ comment time

Seattle Parks is working on a plan for the future of its “Soft Surface Trails” around the city. Your thoughts are being sought – including at a December 20th meeting – not in West Seattle, but not far:

This meeting provides an opportunity to learn about soft surface trails in Seattle and to provide input on the plan for trails within SPR’s natural areas. The final plan will include recommendations for trail-maintenance standards, levels of service and trail hierarchy, a determination process for how new trails are formed and overall guidance for the future of trails throughout Seattle. This plan is not specific to one particular park or area.

The trails meeting is at 6 pm December 20th at the Jefferson Horticulture Building, 1600 S. Dakota. The preview on this Parks website also includes a contact for questions and comments if you can’t make it to the meeting.

West Seattle Hipster December 10, 2016 (11:16 am)

This reads like an article from The Onion. What a collosal waste of time and money. Shouldn’t tax dollars be spent on people in need or for infrastructure improvements?

Local “leadership” is completely out of touch and clueless.

newnative December 10, 2016 (12:51 pm)

More like Portlandia. Because now more than ever, we need more soft surfaces in nature to run on.
- WSB December 10, 2016 (1:17 pm)
  
  By “soft surfaces,” it means gravel, for example, as opposed to total hardscape pavement.

PigeonRidgeBen December 10, 2016 (12:36 pm)

Those living in this region enjoy many shared assets that contribute to all our well being, joy and meaning in life. Access to minimally developed natural areas inside urban areas is one of them. Ongoing efforts to improve and widen this access is energy and money well spent. I look forward to attending this meeting and advocating for some of these efforts to be directed to the city’s largest contiguous natural area, the West Duwamish Greenbelt. This area is adjacent to a diverse group of neighborhoods and communities, many of which are unlikely to enjoy the benifits of natural areas outside the city. These infrastructure improvements also serve ongoing ecological restoration efforts within the city improving biodiversity, water purification, carbon sequestration and other ecological services. These improvements should be viewed as investments that are part of many beneficent efforts to improve the city and region for current occupants and future generations.

Judy December 10, 2016 (5:34 pm)

Well said, Ben. Part of the policy-making mentioned for this trails planning is how new trails or extensions of trails are determined, and that’s of interest to many of us, especially in the West Duwamish Greenbelt where there is no connection to the Duwamish Longhouse, for example.