Print

Email story

Comment

Email editor

Trail for cyclists or dirt supply?

A landowner wants his 324 acres to provide dirt. The county wants to extend a bike trail on it.

By BILL COATS
Published July 23, 2006

KEYSTONE - Off Lutz-Lake Fern Road, Stephen Dibbs hopes to bring thousands of dump trucks to his property.

Hillsborough County hopes to bring thousands of bicyclists. It's undecided on the trucks.

"How twisted is this?" asks activist Denise Layne of Lutz, who hopes for bicyclists but not trucks.

Dibbs, a Northdale developer, owns 324 mostly swampy acres just west of the Suncoast Parkway on Lutz-Lake Fern. He's proposing to dig a 52-acre lake on the land and sell dirt worth nearly $40-million to the construction industry.

The county, meanwhile, plans to buy a half-mile strip of Dibbs' property along Lutz-Lake Fern and build a northern section of the Upper Tampa Bay Trail on it. It may sue Dibbs to condemn the land.

Bicyclists already are close by.

The state's 41-mile Suncoast Trail begins at Lutz-Lake Fern, beside the parkway and just around a curve from Dibbs' eastern property line. On any given week, that end of the trail attracts more than 1,200 cyclists, skaters, runners and walkers, and is the busiest point on the trail by far, said Joanne Hurley, spokeswoman for Florida's Turnpike Enterprise, which owns the parkway and trail.

Long-range, Hillsborough County wants to connect the Suncoast Trail to the Upper Tampa Bay Trail, which currently ends in Citrus Park.

The next step is the northern segment across Dibbs' land. The trail would run from the Suncoast Trail westward along Lutz-Lake Fern for more than a mile, then turn south just east of the Montreaux neighborhood. From there, it would connect to a planned trail head across Gunn Highway from Keystone Park.

County officials disagree with Layne's argument that dump trucks and bicycles won't mix. They say the trail would make Lutz-Lake Fern better for trucks by separating cyclists from the road.

The trail will run along the south side of Lutz-Lake Fern at the point where the dump trucks would exit Dibbs' property on the north side. The trail would cross Lutz-Lake Fern 1,200 feet east of there.

"The proposed land excavation related activities will have no impact on the trail or trail crossing," wrote Charner Reese, a planner for the county's Greenways program.

A member of Reese's Greenways Committee disagreed. "If you have trucks, and they're carrying sand ... that's blowing all over, that's not good," said Janet Hiltz, who uses the Upper Tampa Bay Trail near her home in Citrus Park.

"Hello!" added Layne. "We're going to have a hundred trucks a day crossing that trail."

Three other construction projects loom in the future of the Suncoast/Lutz-Lake Fern intersection:

Until the road is widened, traffic worries will plague any proposed development. Traffic has helped unite a broad coalition of community groups against Dibbs' excavation plans.

"The road is not capable of handling that traffic," said Glen Lathers, safety manager for the Hillsborough County School District.

Lathers noted that McKitrick already has caused jams on Lutz-Lake Fern, and the high school will bring an additional 1,000 cars.

The excavation would take 10 years, according to its application. County planners haven't decided whether to endorse it. They must decide this month; the project's public hearing is set for Aug. 4.

Layne, past president of the Lutz Civic Association and coordinator of the community opposition, said the planners need to think broadly about traffic, schools, the environment and the trail.

"It's pretty obvious that it doesn't put a pretty picture together," she said.

Dibbs said his man-made lake would improve the environment. Dibbs downplayed the traffic criticisms, citing the widespread trade in dirt.

Dump trucks, Dibbs said, "are going to be driving on the same road anyway. It can't be helped."

Dibbs said the trail topic was new to him. "Honestly, I don't know a thing about it," he said. "I haven't heard a word."

Anthony Haynes, a manager in the county's real estate department, said the county sent Dibbs three offers for his land in certified mail. Two mailings came back unaccepted, but somebody at Dibbs' office signed for the third, Haynes said. A staffer will try to call Dibbs, Haynes said.

"I'm always willing to talk," Dibbs said.

Bill Coats can be reached at coats@sptimes.com or 813 269-5309.

[Last modified July 22, 2006, 20:22:07]