Costa Mesa council reaffirms support for bike trail through part of Talbert Park
Costa Mesa City Council members Tuesday expressed their continued support for a proposed bike trail that would pass partly through Talbert Regional Park, although delays at the county level are expected to cost the city about $1.7 million in grant funding.
On a 4-0 vote, the council, with member Jim Righeimer absent, opted to suspend paying consultants for environmental and design work on the portion of the trail that would be in Talbert but continue looking for ways to advance the project.
For the record:
8:46 p.m. May 8, 2024The original version of this article stated that the grants are from the state Active Transportation Program and the Orange County Transportation Authority Bicycle Corridor Improvement Program. They are federal grants.
Talbert is inside Costa Mesa city limits but is owned by Orange County.
“I’d like to make sure that we continue moving forward in whatever manner we can at the staff level,” Mayor Katrina Foley said Tuesday. “We don’t want to just stop after tonight, because there’s been a lot of work done.”
As envisioned, the trail would run for about 1.3 miles between West 19th Street and the Greenville-Banning Channel Trail along the Santa Ana River, then outside Talbert Park along West 19th Street to Placentia Avenue.
Those plans hit a snag, however, when officials from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service informed the city last month that the project can’t move forward until the county prepares a resource management plan — a document identifying all uses of the park.
Because the resource management plan could take months to complete, Costa Mesa likely won’t meet deadlines to secure about $1.7 million in federal grants previously awarded for the project and stands to lose those funds, city Public Services Director Raja Sethuraman said Tuesday.
According to Sethuraman, the deadlines require the city to complete all design and environmental approvals by December.
The grants account for the bulk of the trail’s estimated $2.1 million cost.
It’s possible the city could reapply for the grants in the future, Sethuraman said.
Despite the bump in the road, council members said Tuesday that they still support the project.
“If we’re able to work with the county on this trail and get Fish and Wildlife approval, then at that time we can go forward, because those are basically the two stumbling blocks to us,” Councilman Allan Mansoor said.
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