KCStar supports bike/ped on Paseo Bridge

A Kansas City Star editorial today supports the idea of bicycle/pedestrian accommodations as part of the planned Paseo bridge. This would give the Kansas City are two good, safe bicycle/pedestrian crossing points of the MIssouri River in the downtown area:

Missouri highway planners have agreed to add a bicycle/pedestrian lane to the Heart of America Bridge by 2012 — a welcome move. But so far they have declined to include such a pathway in planning for a new Paseo Bridge, and that’s shortsighted.

The state Department of Transportation points out that connections for walkers and bike riders are better at the Heart of America Bridge. It is closer to the River Market on the Missouri River’s south bank — and to North Kansas City’s commercial district on the north bank.

Such connections are more iffy at the Paseo crossing, where planners are working to increase the number of lanes for Interstates 29 and 35. On the north side of the Paseo Bridge is an industrial and warehouse district, crossed by rail and truck traffic.

Yet an improved Paseo Bridge is expected to last decades, perhaps even as long as a century. Planning for bicycle and pedestrian uses should take a perspective that’s long-term as well.

This week regional planning officials recommended including bicycle/pedestrian accommodations as part of the design of the Paseo Corridor.

If the state follows the recommendation, and it should, this will at least keep the bike-lane idea alive, and the public will soon get a clearer notion of the idea’s feasibility. As Brent Hugh of the Missouri Bicycle Federation put it: “I think they can find a solution that will work. But we won’t know until we reach the next stage of the project.”