You’d think it might be kind of a big deal when a project to expand the K-96 freeway through east Wichita will carve about three acres of land off three Wichita parks.
But on Tuesday, the City Council will be asked to approve a finding by the Kansas Department of Transportation that the loss of parkland is an unavoidable and minimal impact from expanding the freeway from four to six lanes and redoing interchanges at Hillside, Oliver, Woodlawn, Rock, Webb, Greenwich, and 21st.
I seldom drive that segment of highway, which is about as far across Wichita from the southwest side where I live as it’s possible to be.
When I have driven it, I haven’t noticed anything seriously out of whack except where it intersects the I-135 freeway. That’s already being reconstructed as part of the overall improvement to the North Junction, where traffic from K-96 and I-135 and I-235 and K-254 all come together — historically Wichita’s worst bottleneck.
While the current K-96 might meet the needs of a casual user such as myself, the new expansion project appears justifiable given two major changes that have taken place out that way: 1) There’s been an explosion of commercial growth and 2) Even if we don’t need expansion right this minute, more growth is expected and freeway construction costs are likely not getting any cheaper if we wait.
That being said though, I am distressed whenever I see Wichita losing parkland. We don’t have enough already and as growth occurs, we fall further behind.
According to KDOT, the freeway project includes the following impacts on parks:
▪ Removal of 1.8 acres of Chisholm Creek Park South to accommodate the construction of a “diverging diamond” interchange at K-96 and Woodlawn. With diverging diamonds, the traffic on the surface streets basically switch sides to better accommodate flow on and off the freeway.
▪ Removal of 1.3 acres of Chisholm Creek Park North, also to accommodate the Woodlawn exit.
▪ Removal of 0.8 acres of K-96 Lake Park to construct, as the project document calls it, “a braided ramp system from northbound I-135 to eastbound K-96 to accommodate expected weaving movements between traffic bound for eastbound K96 and the Hillside Street interchange.” (I was today years old when I found out that it even is a park. I always thought it was either a drainage basin or someone’s private pond).
▪ Temporary closure, realignment and reconstruction of some segments of the K-96 bike trail, through Chisholm Creek Park South and along the edge of the Lake Park.
KDOT took public comment on the overall project at a hearing in April and accepted written comments for 45 days from March 28 to May 15. “No comments specific to the proposed de minimis park and trail impacts were received,” KDOT reported.
Well, it’s been my experience that if you propose carving three acres off Wichita parks, and you didn’t get a single comment, you didn’t try very hard.
My comfort level would improve considerably if this were to get a little more public discussion and analysis at the city level, rather than just being rubber-stamped on a single no-comment vote on the consent agenda — along with city minutia like accepting cost estimates on paving a handful of dirt streets and some one-day liquor permits.
This might also be a good opportunity for the council to explain to the community how (or if) it plans to replace parkland being lost to the K-96 project.
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