Editor’s Note Mendocinocoast.news has contacted MUSD Superintendent Jason Morse, County Supervisor Ted Williams, and the county public works department about this controversy and will include their comments in a follow-up story. You will need to click on the story link to see updated stories. Other updates will be provided to subscribers only.
Several people contacted Mendocinocoast.news this week to discuss the sudden loss of a public walking trail along Little Lake Road.
Walking path on Little Lake Road? Huh?
Although this byway is typically Mendo glorious amidst towering pine and fir trees, it’s definitely the path less traveled for a reason.
It’s only good for getting from Point A, Cummings Lane, to Point B, the existence of safer shoulder walking, and even a bike path from the school to State Route 1 and beyond to the ocean and the main part of Mendocino.
Until the 300-foot-long footway was suddenly closed off with red construction plastic.
“There’s been yet another surprise awaiting the public in the ongoing saga of the controversial Mendocino Unified School District /Mendocino City Community Services District Water Supply and Storage Project, “ wrote Christina Aranguren on the MCN Listserve and then to this reporter.
“Pedestrians and bicyclists accustomed to using the woodsy, unimproved pedestrian/bike path adjacent to Little Lake Road east of the K-8 school and its school zone should note that the trail was abruptly closed without advance notice in anticipation of project construction. The move has forced users onto Little Lake Road and a pair of dangerous blind curves with embankments instead. When pressed by concerned residents last week, the project manager from GHD, Inc. informed them that the popular trail “was not in the approved plan set” and that they’re looking at rerouting it, contradicting earlier info provided to a neighbor that the closure would be permanent. “
“How this detail got by environmental review, the County of Mendocino, and the Division of the State Architect, whose mission it is to provide design and construction oversight for California schools and facilities, remains to be seen.”
With school less than a month away, trail users and especially parents/guardians of schoolchildren should not only take heed but also consider contacting MUSD’s Board of Trustees for an explanation and a request for immediate action. Public safety should be first and foremost.”
The people who use the path are primarily those who live on Cummings Lane east, including kids walking to school, although none of those could be confirmed.
From all appearances, the path’s existence got forgotten during the planning and construction crews simply put up the orange/red netting around the work site, only to discover they had blocked the towpath used by a particularly vociferous native species- human beings.
This reporter saw a man walking along the highway when I arrived to do the story. This seemed like the perfect photo to show how dangerous walking the double curves could be. Only it was pretty much impossible to take his photo with somebody on my bumper without getting him, or perhaps all of us, killed.
By the time I turned around on Cummings Lane and got the camera aimed, the man hoofed off somewhere northbound, seemingly weirded out by the guy with a Honda full of dogs determined to take his photo.
So I got out and walked the path until I came to the blockage. It was a nice rolling downhill, and cool enough to be a statewide attraction if it was somehow transported to Kansas. I found that people had devised ways to go around the no-trespassing area. The walk then took me through the construction site, where seven test wells are being dug. The idea is to determine if groundwater from wells can be used to create a water supply for the “City” of Mendocino, which is actually not now, nor ever has been a city. The town needs a better water supply for firefighting and drinking. People along Little Lake Road have raised objections about using groundwater that flows toward the ocean under their lands to quench the thirst of the entire town.
After the construction site came the old workyard of the school distrct, where the district where every penny is clearly being squeezed out of their buildings and equipment. A shed only about 15 feet from the road looks like it was built in the Gold Rush times, but probably a little newer than that. Then its back out on the road. There didnt seem to be a great crossing for any kids that might be using the path to get to school.
Then I went back the other way, walking up narrow Little Lake Road. It’s much shorter on the north side of the road, but very scary. After facing into two cars, I decided this wasn’t the way I wanted to go and scurried back to the trail. There, I was found by Rich Jung, a retired nurse whose property abuts the east end of the path. He had been among those who had contacted me.
Jung said walking the road is even more fun when one of the big fire engines from the station further up Little Lake Road goes past.
“These curves are just dangerous to walk on. The way I look at it, somebody is going to get killed if they are forced to walk out there.”
He said the previous owner of his property told him, “don’t ever let them take away the path!”
He said that man had used the path for 60 years.
Notwithstanding a few law-abiding citizens like that poor man with a walking stick I had tried to photograph, Jung said most people simply skipped walking the double curves and resorted to trampling through the construction site, where we had met, both doing that.
There seems to be literal room to compromise. A fence, which extends to the edge of the road appears to belong to the county or one of the two other government agencies involved.
Jung said a safe walkway could be constructed there by moving the fence back.
Mendocinocoast.news has contacted MUSD Superintendent Jason Morse, County Supervisor Ted Williams and the county public works department and will include any of their comments in a follow-up story. You will need to click on the story link to see updated stories. Other updates will be provided to subscribers only. We plan a full story on the water project as well.
The founders of the town called it Mendocino City to differentiate it by its county of the same name, a confusion that continues today. Efforts to call it Mendocino Village at first went unnoticed and then drew the angry ire of locals. So now its just back to being Mendocino, or Mendocino Town, although someone is sure to correct any version said.
