PARK CITY — Planners who map out communities of the future want the cities of tomorrow to incorporate walkable pedestrian and bicycle friendly developments, offer multiple transportation options and reflect a lessened dependence on the automobile.
For Park City, a resort town of 8,000 surrounded by another 21,000 in the Snyderville Basin, the future is now.
Residents bought into the “livable community” concept in 2007 when they passed a $15 million bond issue to fund a series of walkability projects.
Liza Simpson, a member of the City Council, said the first thing city residents had to do was define walkability.
“A large part of what it meant was connectivity,” she said. “It meant people being able to choose their mode of transportation and not be hindered by the lack of a sidewalk or bike path. It’s about making it easier for people to make the choice of a mode of transport that is healthier for the community and themselves.”
Since the bond issue passed in 2007, Park City has completed 30 of 36 projects identified by the citizen-based Walking and Biking Advisory Liaison Committee (WALC), formed to guide the City Council through the prioritization process.
Projects have included pedestrian tunnels on Kearns Boulevard near local schools; an underpass on Bonanza Drive from Iron Horse to Rail Trail; a Safe Routes to School project at Holiday Ranch Loop and a series of trail connections, sidewalks, traffic calming projects and other walkability projects that bubbled up through WALC. A traffic calming and sidewalk project on Comstock Drive and Sidewinder Drive is currently under construction and scheduled for completion in October.
“We hit the biggest safety red flags first to get the biggest bang for our buck,” said Jonathan Weidenhamer, the city’s economic development manager. “We connected regional centers to make sure that people could move easily throughout the city’s borders,” he added.
Heinrich Deters, the city’s trails coordinator, echoed the importance of safety. “Safety was our number one goal. We are a resort town, and we live on return visitors. We wanted our visitors and residents to be able to bike or walk to events such as the summer concerts we have,” he said. Simpson said the walkability initiative was started by a group of mothers concerned about getting their children to school safely.
After the bond passed, the city hired Salt Lake-based Landmark Design to conduct a Walkable/Bikeable Neighborhood Study, which included a trail master plan update.
Weidenhamer said the city has bonded half of the $15 million approved and will bond the remainder when projects are ready for construction.
The biggest piece of the program remaining is the “spine” of the city’s walkability vision, separate bike paths and other walkable-friendly features on Park Avenue and Deer Valley Drive in the heart of the city.
The spine project will link the city’s walkability projects to each other as well as provide a connection to the city’s 350 miles of trails.
Park City leaders understand that maintaining a small-town charm and sense of community will become increasingly difficult as the area continues to develop as one of the leading ski resorts in the world.
“We have a strong sense of community and worry obsessively that we are losing it. We have a lot of change taking place here. That sense of community is our biggest source of pride and our biggest concern,” Simpson said.
Simpson cited two reasons for the city’s forward-thinking mindset. “We are willing to tax ourselves for things we believe our community wants. That’s a big hurdle for a lot of municipalities. We also go on a road trip every year to see what other communities are doing. Then we go and steal the best ideas we can,” she added.
Making Park City a more walkable place to live or visit is not the only objective city leaders have in mind.
“We want to get to a point where there are fewer cars in Park City. We want people to come here and be able to get around without getting in a car,” Weidenhamer said.
Simpson said the Park City of tomorrow will feature more public transportation options. “The whole intermodal conversation is coming. Bus rapid transit, car sharing, there are a number of things we would like to see happen in Park City in the future,” she said.
David Fierro is a communications consultant who resides in Salt Lake City. He specializes in transportation and produces the Utah Transportation Report: www.utahtransportationreport.com.