A new bike path! But . . .

In the news this morning:

Bicycle riders will soon have a new path to navigate through downtown Wichita.

[snip]

The bike path will run from Central and Wichita streets, north to 9th street, then northeast in the former Union Pacific Railroad Corridor to 15th and Broadway.

The $1.35 million project will feature 10-foot-wide bicycle path with entrance arches at both 8th and 15th streets, plus a plaza with a clock tower and drinking fountain in Otis Park at 13th and Market.

The plan will be presented officially today at 5:30 pm at the Midtown Resource Center at 10th and Broadway; construction begins on Thursday and is expected to be completed by April.

Wichita needs bike-paths, no question, especially one that runs through the core of the city as this one does; and I'm pleased to see that this one will make use of part of an abandoned railroad right-of-way. So, why am I (still) a bit underwhelmed?

Here's the route, and (in case anyone needs a reminder) here is a map of currently-existing and proposed routes. As you can see, Wichita is pretty much set with north-south routes on both sides of the core--and, again, it's indeed good that this new one will actually go into that core--but this still does not provide what, in my view, the bike-path/lane network here most lacks in order to become more useful as an alternate commuter/transportation network and not primarily a recreational function: an east-west route that passes more or less through the city's middle. The proposed multi-use conversion of the abandoned railroad right-of-way that parallels 17th Street and then turns southeast to head toward downtown would be an ideal instance of what I mean here; some corresponding route west of downtown would balance that.

In the case of the eastside route, I know there is (or was, in the past) resistance (and, apparently, some legal obstacles as well) to that project. In the post I just linked to, Ms. Fearey also acknowledges that bike-path projects currently in the works assume cycling to be primarily recreation. Clearly, those impediments need to change and perhaps are in the process of changing; they could use nudges of various sorts, though.

So: two cheers for the new path. Here's hoping that sooner rather than later we'll have an announcement of an east-west path or two that will link the east and west sides of the city to its center.