By Glenn Kolp, Guest Columnist
In August, Frank Mason of Andrews was struck and killed on Airport Road in Marble while riding his bicycle. I wrote a letter to the editor at that time questioning why our local legislators and Cherokee County commissioners weren’t pursuing grants to convert the old railroad tracks that run parallel to Airport Road between Andrews and Murphy into a multi-use trail for bikers, hikers, joggers, etc. The tracks and ties are in a state of total disrepair.
On top of that, several years ago our commissioners were able to wrangle the state into reducing the federal required 100-foot right of way for train traffic (50 feet on each side of the center line) down to 25 feet, thereby insuring that trains could never legally run on the tracks again. Nice freebie for the adjacent landowners.
Some time after writing the letter, I attended a Cherokee County Tourism Development Authority meeting to again press the case for why we should lobby the state for this paved trail, which would be a boon for tourism as well as a safe enjoyable form of recreation for local residents. I was told by Commissioner Cal Stiles that he’d already tried talking with state legislators about it years ago, and they weren’t interested in such a project. I explained that in light of the recent fatality, they might be more receptive. He didn’t think so.
Stiles instead proposed that we should work on getting the state to build the trail next to the four-lane highway. While this might be marginally better than no trail at all, I can’t imagine tourists flocking to our area to ride their bikes down the highway. Nor will local families be taking their kids for a Sunday ride to play “identify the roadkill” while sucking up exhaust fumes.
Another bicyclist was recently killed while riding down Airport Road. My question is how many more people need to die before our elected officials do their civic duty? There is literally no project of greater importance than this one. Instead of wasting energy on getting the federal government to privatize the land around our beautiful Hiwassee Lake so you can build a luxury lakefront mansion, do something for the people you represent and save some lives at the same time.
As for the tourism bureau, my question for you is, “Why are you there, and what sort of things are you doing for Cherokee County that could possibly be more important than this?”
Communities across our state have converted abandoned railroad tracks into paved trails using state grants. Don’t tell me we can’t do the same thing. I’m surprised the families of the deceased haven’t sued you all for dereliction of duty.
The writer is a resident of Andrews.