Planners Seek to Put 200-Mile Trail System on the Map : Environment: Officials envision pathways for many types of users. The Ventura County proposal will be unveiled tonight.

His hands spread out on a five-foot-wide map, Ron Blakemore explains how he envisions getting people out of their cars and onto a proposed 200-mile-long system of trails.

“It’s kind of like that old movie thing,” Blakemore said. “If we build it they will come. If people have the facilities, they will use them.”

Blakemore is the administrator of the Regional Trails and Pathways Program, an ambitious system of interlinking trails for bikers, hikers and horseback riders introduced by Ventura County Supervisors Vicky Howard and Maggie Kildee.

With the help of a 38-member advisory committee, Blakemore has spent the last year developing a trail system so extensive that it promises to allow residents to step out of their cars and roam Ventura County from one end to another, not just for pleasure, but also for commuting.

His giant maps of the county are crisscrossed with double blue and fuchsia lines racing from city to city, following riverbeds, coastline and ridgelines.

Almost like a child’s game of navigating a room without ever touching the floor, the new Regional Trails and Pathways plan would establish a system of trails separate from roadways.

The draft plan will be unveiled tonight at a 7 o’clock meeting in the Rancho Santa Susana Community Center in Simi Valley. Six more meetings are scheduled to gather public comment on the plans throughout the summer.

Blakemore will incorporate suggestions from the public and then present a revised plan to city governments and agencies throughout Ventura County.

If he can persuade the more than 50 government entities to sign off on the proposal, it will go to the Ventura County Board of Supervisors for final approval.

Blakemore acknowledges that the plan is still 15 to 20 years away from completion. But he thinks Ventura County is on the cutting edge of a new concept--combining transportation with recreation.

“We’re going to be the model for all other counties,” he said.

One study estimated that 50,000 county commuters could use part of the trail system each day, and Blakemore believes that number will probably be closer to 10,000.

While many cities, such as Seattle and Berkeley, have made it easier for commuters to travel by bicycle, Blakemore said Ventura County would be the first place he knows of to establish multipurpose trails that meet the needs of equestrians, hikers and bike commuters simultaneously.

The answer, he says, lies in establishing a trail etiquette to be followed by all users. A horse gets the right of way, followed by foot traffic, with bikers moving aside for both. Though hikers and mountain bikers fight over trails in some parts of the nation, Blakemore said Ventura County cyclists and walkers have friendlier relationships.

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The trail system has received considerable support from business leaders at advisory committee meetings. Supervisor Kildee said businesses want to encourage two-wheeled commuting, but fear that roadways are not safe enough for bikers.

“The fatality of the Amgen employee has raised our awareness,” Kildee said, referring to the death of Amgen researcher Walter Tupper, 26, who died in May after being hit by a car while commuting on his bicycle. “Making commuting by bike safer is a priority.”

Some of the proposed pathways lie along flood-control channels, while others pass through farmlands. Before the first trail is cut, lengthy negotiations have to be carried out with private owners and public agencies.

Advisory committee member Bob Smith has concentrated his efforts on figuring out a way to get hikers and bikers from Camarillo, over the Conejo Grade and into Newbury Park. He has come up with several routes without particularly steep grades. All that remains, he said, is persuading landowners to let commuters on bikes whiz past their property.

“I think we’re getting close,” Smith said. “Nothing is impossible, you just have to be patient.”

Neither Kildee nor Howard could put a price tag on the trail system, saying it was too early to estimate costs.

No one denies the price will be steep. But Blakemore said plans call for establishing a nonprofit foundation to support the trails and demanding that developers set aside land for the trail system. The county would also seek volunteers to patrol the trails and solicit corporate sponsors.

At this point the plan is hardly more than lines on a map. The county, along with Fillmore, Ventura and Santa Paula, is negotiating to buy an easement along the 32-mile stretch of the Santa Paula Railway for an estimated $9 million. If that sale goes through, a major component of the trail system’s backbone would be established along the tracks.

So far, the only established parts of the system are the nearly 10-mile Ojai Trail and the six-mile stretch along the Arroyo Simi in Simi Valley. Sixteen miles down and at least 184 to go.

“I think I have enough imagination to carry it forward,” said Blakemore. “All I’ve got to do is pull it off.”