Columbia Business Times has suggestions for Columbia's PedNet Project

An article in the Columbia Business Times had these suggestions for Columbia's ongoing non-motorized "PedNet Project":

But when I was growing up, we were taught to use residential streets as pedways. The problems that we had were the inability to safely cross major right of ways.

It’s time for this project to start connecting neighborhoods. That doesn’t mean building new trails — it means connecting neighborhoods where they cannot be connected through normal, marginally used right of ways. Build some connectors to quiet, residential streets. Build a few bridges that go across huge ravines that block me from conveniently getting from point A to point B via residential streets on my feet or bicycle. Enhance routing capability so that I can find how to get from point A to point B in the least traffic-bound scenario using the Internet.

Our $23 million can go a long way if these things happen. I don’t mind 8-foot wide sidewalks on one side of a street that are connected throughout a community that accept and acknowledge that people want to go to places that many of the pedway folk don’t like — such as Wal-Mart. Get me to grocery stores and shopping plazas, and even get me to the library.

Read more of David Schorr's ideas here.