Posted: 2/28/06
Not a smooth ride at bike trail meeting
By David Heiller
Argus News Editor
Members of a Houston County trails committee received a healthy dose of criticism at an open house last week.
The group, a subcommittee of the Houston County Economic Development Authority (EDA), held the meeting at the Houston Nature Center on February 23.
The goal, chairman Tom van der Linden explained at the start, was to get a feel for what land could be used as a year-round trail between Houston and La Crosse.
ìWe donít have any kind of an alignment in mind,î van der Linden said.
Most land owners donít want it, Grant Olson replied to that statement.
ìGot that right,î Don Meyer of Houston said.
Carol Soland of Hokah agreed with them too. She said there is a bike trail along Highway 16 that the Minnesota DNR approved in the 1980s. ìThatís why thereís such a wide lane on the edge of the road,î she said.
Jean Meiners, a trails committee member who works for the Minnesota Department of Transportation, said itís not a designated bike trail.
ìI know damn well itís a designated bike trail!î Soland responded.
ìWhat our group is asking for is not that kind of trail,î van der Linden said. It wants a designated trail, off highway, and safe for families, he said.
After that exchange, committee members spent the next 45 minutes talking and listening to individuals. They pored over aerial photographs of the area, trying to determine possible routes that could extend the Blufflands State Trail System east out of Houston to Hokah, Millerís Corner, La Crescent, and La Crosse.
Two sides of the coin
The private comments reflected two sides of the issue.
Soland said she is worried about the trails group coming after her land in Hokah. She thinks it could happen through eminent domain, and that she could lose an abandoned railroad bed that she and others fought to purchase.
ìI just want to keep my land intact,î she said.
A lot of other people are against the idea, but they donít come to meetings, she added.
Soland opposes bike trails. They are paved and maintained with no user fees from the ìweekend wondersî that use them, and they donít help businesses, she feels.
But Jayne Sheffer and Jim Schultz expressed different views. Sheffer, the Hokah Township treasurer, estimated that about 75 percent of her townshipís residents feel itís time to do something with a trail.
Part of it would be accessible to snowmobilers, Sheffer said. ìSo that helps a lot,î she said. ìItíd sure be nice to hook up the La Crosse ones with what weíve got in Hous-
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