Belleville City Council approves Iron Belle Trail route in city

The Iron Belle Trail walking/biking link through the city of Belleville was unanimously approved by the Belleville City Council at its regular meeting on Monday, May 6.
The city route is the link between Van Buren Township’s route on the west that comes into the city on the Denton Road Bridge and the VBT route that picks up at Edgemont Street and heads west to the Huron Clinton Metropark part of the trail.
The trail is planned to go through the state from Belle Isle in Detroit to Ironwood in the Upper Peninsula. The VBT/Belleville part of the trail was one of the biggest unplanned links.
At Monday’s meeting, Belleville Downtown Development Authority Coordinator Carol Thompson introduced Jeff Smith of PEA, Inc., civil engineers, who said the trail through the city begins at the Denton Road Bridge and heads down High Street, turning southeast on Church Street and east on W. Columbia Avenue. It connects to E. Huron River Drive and ends at the “funded section” of Iron Belle Trail at Edgemont.
He said they will be taking advantage of existing sidewalks for the walkers and creating a “sharrow” street marking for the bicyclists, would result in no property acquisition in the city. Smith said the right of way is large enough to accommodate a path until the funded section.
Roads and sidewalks would be maintained by the City of Belleville.
“We love anything that brings people to our city,” Thompson said.
Smith said private grant money is now available for the project, along with federal and state funds. They can’t apply for funds until the route is proposed.
He said downtown Belleville has lots of things and scored really high. He said they came up with the really good route described above after studying three other proposed routes.
Smith said the Denton Road Bridge connects downtown Belleville to the Van Buren Park part of the route.
He said there is no real pedestrian path on the bridge, but when the bridge is rebuilt in the future, they will ask the county to include a 10’ sidewalk.
The trail through the city is designated as a walking trail, but there will be places for cyclists as well. He said there is not a lot to build in the city because it has sidewalks, but they will look at walking components, such as better crosswalks and handicapped accessible upgrades.
He said people who park in the city and ride to the Metropark for lunch and then back again, just under eight miles. He said people from Belleville could go all the way through Washtenaw County on the trail.
He said they are now moving into preliminary engineering.
In discussing signs, Thompson noted the Iron Belle Trail has a logo that should be included.
“We will look at crossings and how much it would cost to make it safe,” Smith said.
In other business at the May 6 meeting, the council:
• Approved a gathering of members of GreyHounds of Eastern Michigan and their leashed dogs from 6 to 10 p.m. on Saturday, May 18, on the Fourth Street Square. The Bayou Grill will be providing dinner for the 30-40 people who are expected. The group is a non-profit adoption agency and will be showing the dogs hoping to get adoptions. This gathering follows events with the greyhounds at the Wayne County Fairgrounds. The dogs will stay on leashes because they are sight hounds and if they see something they go and don’t know how to get back, the council was told;
• Discussed using a synthetic roping on the posts at Horizon Park, since the natural roping tends to deteriorate and break. DPW Director Rick Rutherford said there is 1,000 feet of footage and with the wraps around the posts, 1,800 feet is needed. Estimated cost is $3,139.20. City Manager Diana Kollmeyer said a local resident offered to help pay for this and so it wouldn’t be all city dollars. Maybe they wouldn’t want wraps. She said they are looking for feedback. Council members agreed they liked the looks of the wrap. Mayor Pro Tem Jack Loria suggested they get prices for installation so the two-man DPW wouldn’t have to be taken away from other work. Councilman Jesse Marcotte said the funding for this project should be partnered with the DDA. Also, the city could look into getting more park funds from the county. More information will be brought to the next meeting on May 20;
• Was presented with the first draft of the budget for fiscal year ending June 30, 2020, prepared using estimates and department head requests. This budget shows general fund expenditures in excess of revenues of about $53,000. Also, the general fund is supporting the Cemetery Fund with $15,500 and the Capital Purchase Fund with $33,000. The budget does not include the cost of seawall repair and council members want that in this budget. The city has not received notification of a Headlee rollback so that is not in the budget and the DDA budget is not included since it has not been adopted. The council also wants a capital improvement list attached. “I have a 30+ year old fire truck with maintenance that is a nightmare,” said Fire Chief Brian Loranger. The budget, with changes, will be brought back to the May 20 meeting;
• Approved accounts payable of $124,799.79 and the following purchases in excess of $500: to Morton Salt, $9,279.91 for road salt from the Streets Fund; to Metro Environmental Svc., $1,285 for a sewer main from the Water Fund; to Paul and Barbara Denski, $675 for grave buyback from the Cemetery Fund; and to Wise Technologies, $720 for computers/network from various funds;
• Heard Rutherford report that they are in the process of getting the MDEQ permit for the seawall work at Doane’s Landing and are waiting for the rolling of the steel for the project. “As soon as we’ve got this, they’re ready to go,” Rutherford said, adding the barge is in the water. He said they will be staging in the DPW yard and launched from the nearby DNR launch; and
• Heard Kollmeyer said repairs to the Veterans Memorial are being discussed with Van Buren Township as a partner. She said the cost is estimated at $18,000.