According to surveys conducted for the plan, people most wanted to see:
- Better connections to the Great Miami River Trail
- Improvements along Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard, Ohio 4, High Street and Main Street
- A better solution for the High Street railroad overpass, which people found to be dangerous for pedestrians and bicyclists
- Gaps in sidewalks, especially near schools and along Main Street near the Meijer store
The transportation plan builds on Hamilton’s comprehensive plan, called Plan Hamilton, which was approved in 2019.
The plan recommends 23.9 miles of on-street bicycle lanes, 18 miles of off-street biking lanes, 4.1 miles of sidewalks and 19 other improvements at specific locations.
Katie O’Lone of Toole Consulting in Columbus told Hamilton City Council on Wednesday one purpose of the study “was to understand what are people’s barriers to walking and biking in Hamilton? Where are people walking and biking now?”
Feedback was gathered at neighborhood meetings and through online public surveys. Some 330 people responded to an early online survey. Another 154 responded to a later online survey, coming from 16 of the city’s 17 neighborhoods.
A key biking path in Hamilton is the Great Miami River Trail, which has a daily average traffic of 259 users — 225 weekday users and 342 on weekends.
Among top locations people want to travel to are the High and Main street areas in the downtown area; High Street east of the downtown; the under-construction Beltline bicycle path on the West Side; Flubs Ice Cream; the Hamilton freshman school and high school; Marcum Park; Pyramid Hill Sculpture Park; the future Spooky Nook Sports Champion Mill indoor sports complex; and Main Street on the far western part of town.
The plan recommends continued work on the Beltline biking/hiking path; bicycling lanes on roadways around the riverfront to create a loop connected to the Spooky Nook complex; converting Ohio 4 into a “multimodal corridor” that provides pathways for pedestrians and bicyclists; and the Miami to Miami bicycle trail, linking the Great Miami and Little Miami rivers.
Among the highest priorities for improvement are sidewalks on both sides of Main Street from Gardner Road to near Stahlheber Road; a sidewalk on NW Washington Boulevard near the freshman school and high school; the Beltline trail; a biking/hiking path along the west bank of the Great Miami River from Pershing Avenue to Pyramid Hill; a bike path along Ohio 4 between Fair Avenue and Bobmeyer Road; a bike path along Second Street from Court Street to Knightsbridge Drive; and a bike lane along Grand Boulevard from East Avenue to the railroad tracks that can link the Great Miami River Trail to Ohio 4 and the future Miami to Miami trail.
Here’s one suggestion in the report: When the North Hamilton Crossing bridge is built, the current Black Street Bridge should become a walking/biking/transit bridge only, with other vehicles banned. The bridge, built about a century ago, is nearing the end of its useful life for vehicle traffic.
“People wanted to see improvements along Route 127, or MLK (Boulevard), Route 4; High Street and Main Street,” O’Lone said. “The High Street railroad underpass was brought up several times as being not really comfortable walking underneath. And then several missing sidewalks or sidewalk gaps are part of that pedestrian network.”
About the Author
