Friends of The Fond du Lac Loop Meeting Report

Meeting Date: October 21 2015

Attendees:

Steve Little, Jordan Skiff, Sandi Roehrig, Rick Moulten , Kya Schnettler, Bruce Fryda, Pete Doll, Deb Doll, John McDowell.

Jordan Skiff began the meeting with:

A preview of Loop plans for 2016 with details about a Loop trail development through Ledgeview Corporate Center. The plan will put the Agnesian Health care facility, the new Grande Cheese Corporate Headquarters, Society Insurance and several other significant new businesses right on or adjacent to the Loop. Route Description: The route will go from the Prairie Trail across the Martin St rail overpass bridge then West onto a 10’ wide paved trail to Agnesian continuing on to Camelot Dr. Jordan’s first plan included a trail through the land owned by CD Smith, but this was not supported by CD Smith. Jordan provided an alternate plan to add a bike path along Camelot Dr instead. Steve Little did offer to contact Justin Smith to discuss options of returning to the original (interior route) trail plan thereby saving on construction costs and having a more tranquil and beautiful route. (Thank you Steve!). Continuing west on the new trail, the user will exit the Corporate Center onto Mihill Ave North, West onto East Lane to Main (a fairly quiet intersection), then cross here onto the West side of Main. There will be a new 10’ wide trail going south and rejoining the Loop at the Walgreens next to Pioneer Rd. ‘Whew!’
Lakeside Park plans; Mercury Marine denied easement along Fond du Lac River going North from Scott St. Jordan proposed shifting the Loop to use Sibley to Doty to Scott St and moving the flashing stop beacons to the Doty/Scott intersection. Loop would then go by the Children’s Museum connecting to a new trail across green space going out to the shores of Lake Winnebago and following the lakeshore east towards the Light House.Initially, the Loop will have to use the Promen Dr. Bridge. Sandi mentioned the possibility of a new Loop bridge as an exciting fundraising goal. After the bridge crossing, the Loop will traverse the Lakeside Park Island on a new route to an existing bike/ped bridge onto an 80 yd stretch of Park Ave then to the current Loop route that goes east along Harbor Dr.
Funding: I will not give exact figures in this report because the numbers are looking to change quite a bit. Suffice it to say that a powerful combination of Agnesian, City and TIF resources are in play plus FAF Loop donations and other support and additional business donors that are in the pipeline.

Bottom line is that The Loop is really something remarkable and special to this community and our Corporate, City, and Citizen Groups recognize this!

Following Jordan’s Loop plan presentation discussion moved to a partial update of the 2014 Loop vision list:

The already mentioned plans presented by Jordan are on target for a 2016 completion date.
Discussion on future plans to explore paving the Peeples Trail to allow for handicap access in addition to rollerblade, road bike, trike and skate board use. Also a continuation of the Peeples trail across Winnebago Dr with a new bridge bringing the Loop directly into Lakeside Park East.
Arrows and signage are well received and will continue to be updated.
Discussion about Friends support for blind spot line divider markings on Prairie Trail.
Decision to do Loop funding requests through our existing Friends of The Fond du Lac Executive group.
Discussion about at least one new trail opening event/celebration coinciding with the opening of the new trails in 2016.

Conclusion: It was a great meeting and I really appreciate you all taking precious time out of your day to be part of this really amazing project.

Thank you!

John McDowell

Friends of the Fond du Lac Loop