Liberty Lake Trail Link Moves Ahead

Sat., June 10, 2000

By Trinity Hartman trinityh@spokesman.com

For Liberty Lake residents, the Centennial Trail is so near, yet so far away.

Interstate 90 runs between the community and the trail, making access possible only by competing with traffic headed over the Harvard Road freeway interchange bridge.

By the end of next summer, the trip from Liberty Lake to the trail will seem a little less daunting.

The state recently approved a $460,000 grant to help pay for a pedestrian and bicycle bridge to be built over the Interstate. The bridge will be designed this summer and should be completed by the end of next summer.

“This was our top priority, so we’re pretty excited about it,” said Tom Specht, a Liberty Lake resident and a member of the advisory committee for the Liberty Lake Transportation Benefit District.

The district was formed after Liberty Lake voters passed a $650,000 trails bond in November. The bond money was earmarked for improving the system of bike and pedestrian trails in the area.

The bridge project will end at Mission Avenue, which is just north of I-90. That will leave a half-mile gap between Mission and the Centennial Trail, meaning bicyclists and pedestrians will still have to ride or walk along Harvard Road before reaching the trail.

The county does not yet have funding to pay for that final link, county engineering administrator Pat Harper said.

“It’s kind of like a jigsaw puzzle,” Harper said. “We have to get all the pieces to have the connectivity.”

Several trail projects funded by the bond will be built this summer.

More than a mile of separated asphalt trails will go in along sections of Sprague and Molter, which currently have narrow travel lanes and gravel shoulders. Spokane County will build those trails, which should cost $125,000.

The county also has plans to build trails along a one-mile stretch of Liberty Lake Road from Country Vista Drive south to Sprague Avenue.

Developer Jim Frank of Greenstone Corp., will donate the land for the trails. The state, county and the Liberty Lake Sewer District will fund the $313,000 project.

It will be designed this summer and built during next year’s construction season, Harper said.

The most exciting part for Specht and other trail advocates is that there will still be money left for additional projects after these have been completed.

“After we get these done, we’re going to take a breather and then start developing a second phase,” Specht said.

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