Site hosted by Angelfire.com: Build your free website today!

Rails to Trails

Worst Things

Rosemary and Bill Hotaling are happily retired and living in a large house which belonged to the first mayor of DePere,Wisconsin. An abandoned railroad runs through their backyard. Now a multitude of strangers walks through their yard, between the river and the house, on the former railroad tracks. They've been struck by "Rails to Trails."

Rails to Trails (RTT) sounds like a good idea at first, and in many cases it is, but occasionally the government just goes too far. The RTT program is designed to change abandoned railroad tracks into biking trails. When RTT started working in the Hotaling's yard, Bill had no idea who these people were and why they were tearing up his yard. No one had consulted residents about putting a trail in their yards.

The RTT program then held meetings with the residents--after the work had already started. One of the persons in favor of the trail, who lived in the upstairs of an apartment complex, quoted that he'd "rather have his kids run over by a bicycle than a train." The tracks were deserted! Even though more people voted against the trail than for it, the trail program continued.

And another issue I would like to bring up is that the program doesn't even own the tracks! When the mayor of DePere lived in Hotalings's house, long before they did, he understood the benefits of having a rail system, so he gave the train company a right of way.

A right of way is NOT, by any means, ownership! Later, RTT bought the right of way from the railroad, which doesn't make much sense since the right of way was permission to let a train go by at a certain time of day. As you can expect, RTT isn't planning on sending a train through peoples yards at a fixed time of the day. Instead it has invited the public to traipse through the backyards of DePere residents.

Another problem is trash (e.g., litter, dog poop, graffitti). When confronted about litter, RTT said it would put out dumpsters and trash cans in people's yards. People don't want trash cans in their backyard!

Plus people don't want strangers walking in their yard. Some residents would want to put up a fence. Now, normal picket fences would be vandalized so expensive wire fences must be used. The Hotaling's have a dog that they walk down to the river and back every day, but with a fence in the middle of their yard, even with a gate, it would be a nuisance.

With all these things against it, why doesn't the Rails to Trails program simply stop? Who knows?

Other areas of my site

Home
links
Drip Chronicles

Email: jandor@gbonline.com