Dangerous spot on the Shunga Trail
5:33 p.m. Monday, July 7, 2008
"Somebody riding 5, 10, 15 miles an hour, goes off there, is going to be disastrous for them," said Jim Warner.
He lives across the street from the Shunga Trail and rides his bike along the sidewalk. He often checks this area when it rains because it's a far drop.
"Every time the creek rises that high, this disintegrates right at this point, it's kind of a curve in the creek," said Warner.
Jim demonstrates how close it is to the drop off, and how bikers wouldn't see it.
Approximate location of trail danger
"There's a lot of bikers along here, and they will veer out onto the grass to pass the family, rather than try to work their way through them, and if they come off to this side," said Warner. "And this is the only point on the trail that I know of that you have probably a nine foot drop off within three feet of the sidewalk."
We measured how far it is from the edge of the sidewalk to this drop off. It's about four feet. If you were to fall down this drop off, it's about 14 feet from our measurements. You wouldn't be coming back up this way without a rope, and someone to help you.
Our photographer tried to get down to the bottom of the drop off, and had to go through all of this.
And just feet from where the drop ends, there's another one that goes into the creek. Jim says it needs to be fixed.
"And it's not apparent, and so I called the City, roughly in the middle of June after the last high water," said Warner.
After we got involved and told the City about the problem last week, City spokesman David Bevens said Parks and Recreation is going to put up a temporary fence tomorrow.
Crews are going to figure out how to stabilize the bank. We'll let you know when they come up with a final decision.
49 Community Report
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