DES MOINES, February 4, 2009 –Three Iowa Senate leaders took a strong stand this week in favor of a rapid completion of the expansion project that would add a 33-mile “North Loop” to the Raccoon River Valley Trail.

Senator Matt McCoy, of Des Moines; Senator Staci Appel, of Ackworth, and Senator Daryl Beall, of Fort Dodge, are Democrats whose districts include or connect to the RRVT.  McCoy is also a bicyclist who has ridden the full length of the current 56-mile-long trail, from the Des Moines metro area to the north trailhead in Jefferson.

All three told the Capitol press corps on Tuesday, February 3, that they support inclusion of the RRVT’s expansion project for either the state or federal economic “stimulus” programs under consideration.

“The Raccoon River Valley Trail is the biggest regional project in the state of Iowa, affecting 14 different cities and three counties,” said Senator Appel, a member of the Rebuild Iowa Committee.  ”If we are looking for long-lasting economic stimulus, I suggest we finish this trail and give serious consideration to finishing other trail projects in Iowa.”

Beall noted that the cost of adding the 33-mile “North Loop,” and resurfacing five miles of original RRVT trail between Panora and Yale, has been set at $6.1 million, and that $3.98 million of that has been secured in grants and donations.  ”With a $2.1 million investment, we can finish this 89-mile trail,” said Beall, who is vice-chair of the Transportation Committee and a member of the Economic Growth Committee. “In the process, we will create a 72-mile loop that is absolutely unique among all the trails in the United States.”

Senator McCoy, chair of the Transportation & Infrastructure Budget Subcommittee, said the RRVT expansion project “clearly meets the definition of ’shovel ready.’  We can quickly put people to work and stimulate economic activity.  And in a time when more Iowa families are looking for ways to vacation close to home, we can expand their choices.”

Chuck Offenburger, of Cooper, secretary of the Raccoon River Valley Trail Association advocacy group, told the media, “My message is simple — we are ready.  We’ve raised more than three-quarters of the cost, purchased the property, surveyed it, built or rebuilt the bridges, and hired the engineer.  All that’s left to do is grading and paving.  We could be hiring people this spring, opening new trail this summer and using the completed trail next summer.”

Offenburger explained that the reason the RRVT project is in such an advanced stage of readiness “is that we’ve been working on this for nearly four years. It’s not something we’ve rushed to put together in recent weeks when talk about the stimulus programs started.”

In an effort led by Mike Wallace, director of the Dallas County Conservation Board, the RRVT expansion project has been carefully prepared and presented to the Vision Iowa Program, where it is in “negotiations” — and thus still under consideration for funding.  It was also submitted for the stimulus program the federal government is considering.

“We’ve got some of the work already underway, on pieces of the project that we’d already secured funding for,” Offenburger said. “Getting the $2.1 million would mean that when work starts again now, we could be finishing the whole project quickly instead of piecemealing it.”

Senator Beall cited figures that 75,000 people per year were using the original section of the RRVT in the 1990s, when its east terminus was in Waukee.  After 1999, when the trail was extended east through Waukee and Clive to the Clive Green Belt Trail — thus connecting to the Des Moines metro trails — the RRVT’s annual usage numbers jumped to 125,000 and then 150,000 in a matter of two years.

The completion of the “North Loop” project would mean the addition of the towns of Dallas Center, Minburn, Perry, Dawson and Jamaica to the existing trail.  It would also create a 72-mile loop, which would be by far the longest, biggest trail loop in the nation.  Some towns are circled by a loop trail, but none would begin to approach the distance of the RRVT’s loop.

The loop is expected to attract people who will spend two and three days riding the trail, staying in different towns along it, instead of just spending a day on the trail.

With the connection to the metro trails, and the completion of the loop, RRVT Association officials have predicted trail usage numbers could hit 400,000 per year.

“That’s why three counties and 14 towns have not only endorsed the expansion project, they’ve also made financial commitments to it,” Offenburger said. “They see this expansion not as a recreation project, but rather as crucial economic development.  You can imagine that when people in, say, Perry, realize that 400,000 more people could be coming into their community every year, they’re excited.”

The project not only has the financial participation from all the community and county government entities, it has also received such recent federal, state, corporate and private donations as these:

$75,000 from the Raccoon Valley Bank; $17,100 from the Iowa Department of Health for bi-lingual trail signage in Perry; more than $11,000 from individual trail users responding to a fundraising letter in late 2008; $10,000 each from Prairie Meadows, the Bock Family Foundation and the “Bikes Belong” program; and $5,000 each from Alliant Energy and Casey’s General Stores.

Late in January, it was announced that Dallas County Conservation will receive a $750,000 “statewide transportation enhancement grant,” which are federal dollars managed by the Iowa Department of Transportation.

And even earlier, the project has benefitted from funds directed to the trail towns and counties from the state’s “REAP” and “Great Places” programs.

All that has set up the push toward rapid completion that is happening now.

Butch Niebuhr, city administrator in Perry and a member of the board of the RRVT Association, was asked by the press how many jobs the trail expansion would create.

“In construction jobs, which could start immediately, it’d probably be from 50 to 100, maybe more, during the building stage,” Niebuhr said. “But it also has inspired the start of new businesses — a hotel in Yale and a person who wants to open a restaurant-bar in Dawson are examples — and all the new businesses mean more permanent jobs.”

Later Niebuhr added, “But, you know, it’s not just job creation that is important. Job retention is just as big a concern for us.  With this economy, we’ve got a whole lot of small town businesses that are really struggling.  We’re looking for ways to keep people coming through their doors and doing business, so they can keep their employees and grow themselves.”

Also on hand for the session with the Capitol press were State Representative Donovan Olson, a Democrat from Boone whose district includes parts of the RRVT, and Perry City Council member Jay Pattee.

Article Published: 02-04-2009