By David Slone
Times-Union

WARSAW — A drone mishap means Triad Associates Inc. will be doing the survey work for the Chinworth Trail extension a little more old fashioned.

At Thursday’s, March 21, Kosciusko County Parks and Recreation Board meeting, Stuart Savka, representing Triad, the engineering firm hired for the project, said, “The only update I can give is that our surveying crew, we had a little mishap on their drone, but what we’ve done is we’ve instructed them actually then to go out and use the old-fashioned method.”

He said the drone crashed as they were starting the survey, but it’ll be okay.

“It won’t take long for them to do it, whether they do it the old-fashioned way on their old equipment and setting points or if they do it with the drone equipment,” Savka stated. “Once they get it done, it’ll be a week, two weeks, so for sure by your next meeting we’ll have everything.”

He said John Nelson, from Triad’s northern office, will be meeting with the Kosciusko County Highway Department.

Once they get past the surveying portion of the project, Savka said the design portion will be a “piece of cake.”

Board member Matt Metzger asked if the surveyors have had any questions from the public asking them what they were doing out there. Savka said he hasn’t heard anything, but he was sure that would come up at some point.

“It shouldn’t take that long. If they do it by drone, that’s one day. But, normally, that should take about two days to do. It’s their paperwork that they do afterwards that’s the bulk of that time, and then getting that to us and so we review, and then go back with them and go over the information, and after that do a plotting on a map,” Savka said.

Aggie Sweeney, board vice president, said she knows one of the homeowners along that strip of road on Old 30 of phase 1 of the project. “She is ecstatic that the trail is coming through because walking along that road to get down to Chinworth and down to the athletic complex is treacherous. So I just wanted to share that at least she knows that things are starting to happen and we’re looking at construction next year, and she’s really excited about it,” Sweeney said.

She also reported she was contacted by an associate of the Kosciusko Board of Realtors engagement committee. Through their professional association, Sweeney said they can apply for grant funds to help move community projects forward. Sweeney met with two from the committee last week and they said they would like to – by October – apply for a grant of up to $7,500 for some type of amenity that could be a part of the trail.

What they discussed the grant funding could be used toward would be something like a bicycle rack, a bench or some type of wayfinding signage. Sweeney said she discouraged them from thinking about gardens because of maintenance. She also told them that hopefully by summer there would be a good enough idea of where an amenity could be and what might be appropriate.

Metzger asked Savka when they might be able to know further information on trail extension details like which side of the road it may be on. Savka said it possibly may be the end of April or May.

Sweeney said it would be helpful for the board to have more clarity on the timeline for the project at their April 18 meeting.

Moving on to the greenways and blueways master trail plan, Sweeney said Katie Clark, landscape architect and project manager at Taylor Siefker Williams (TSW) Design Group, the company working on the master plan, ended up not being able to make Thursday’s meeting due to a conflict.

However, Clark sent an update on the master plan to Sweeney via email, which Sweeney read aloud.

On Feb. 26, the master plan steering committee had their kickoff meeting. Sweeney said 100% of the steering committee was able to participate in that meeting, along with the full park board.

“So I think it was a really strong kickoff to the trails planning process,” she said.

Since then, Clark mentioned to Sweeney that physical condition mapping and analysis have begun and all of Clark’s team members are focused on a specific portion of the assessment.

Clark has had a discussion with Donny Ritsema, from the Michiana Area Council of Governments, to better understand the park planning effort, intended goals and available mapping data. Ritsema is providing Clark with data and will serve as a resource throughout the trails planning effort.

The week of March 25, TSW will be launching the public phasing tools, including website updates, social media posting and digital map tool. When those are ready, Clark’s team will coordinate with the county parks board for a press release and/or social media updates. Members of the TSW team will be reaching out to coordinate a public information display that will be at the Fat + Skinny Tire Festival in May.

The next steering committee meeting will be in late April and will be focused on “reviewing an updated route map and an initial set of design documents,” Sweeney said.

Metzger asked who will be writing the press release. Sweeney said she had a feeling that TSW would write it but the parks board would approve it.

Sweeney said it looks like it’ll be about October before the trails master plan is complete.

“We have a lot of work to do and I think we’re ready,” she said.

On the steering committee kickoff meeting, board member Troy Turley stated he thought it was a great use of time and it seemed like everyone was fully engaged and they received a lot of good feedback. “I was really, really happy with the structure and the way it all came together,” he said.

At their Nov. 30 meeting, the board selected a bid from Triad Associates Inc. for the design and engineering work of the trail extension; and on Nov. 16 selected TSW for the master plan. The county set aside $750,000 in American Rescue Plan Act funds for the design and build of the greenway extension and almost $80,000 for the master plan. The town of Winona Lake also has about $30,000 in grant funding it has offered to go toward the master plan.

Under further business, Metzger suggested the board needed to be thinking about what was the next project and what were they going to start pushing next. He said they should add that discussion to the April 18 agenda so they’re “moving and keeping the ball rolling.”

Sweeney asked him if he thought that would come as a result of the trails master plan or if the board could make that decision before the plan is completed.

Metzger said Georgia Tenney, who was sitting in at the board meeting, had a very invested interest in seeing the Winona Lake trail extended out to Pierceton. In his mind, Metzger said that’s a higher priority and something the county recreation and parks board needs to do.

“So I do think we can get something moving without waiting, but that’s just me,” he said.

Turley said maybe one of the things they could do along those lines was talk about other low-hanging fruit opportunities.

“Because I don’t want to just sit up here and waste our time and maybe the community’s looking to us to get things done, so I want to be looked at as the board that’s getting things done,” Metzger said. “If we can keep moving, I would love to do that.”
Turley said Metzger had his support.

The board agreed they could dream all they want but they’ve also got to figure out how to pay for it.