City acts on Whychus Creek access

Several residents from the neighborhoods close to the Creekside Road bridge over Whychus Creek addressed their concerns about public creek access to the city council Thursday. They were surprised and pleased to learn that the city was already in the process of addressing the issue, and had identified no less than three public access points.

This access issue was first raised at council president McKibben Womack's Town Hall meeting on Tuesday, September 24, at HopNBean. There is a new home being constructed on a long-vacant lot that has served as the local creek access for a number of families in the neighborhood. The sealing off of this access brought this issue to a head for local residents.

Using maps, City Manager Andrew Gorayeb explained the location of these as-yet-undeveloped public access points.

Gorayeb said, "We want to make sure we thoroughly research this before we publish it. We want to make sure we talk to the HOAs, and that everyone is OK with posting this information and distributing it to everyone that lives in those neighborhoods."

Gorayeb also negated the assertion that the property lines of the creekside homes extend to the edge of the water.

The city committed to clearly marking the public access points, and then barking the 20-foot-wide access trails to the creek. The public right-of-way to the creek extends 10 feet on either side of the mutual property line of the properties involved.

Mayor Brad Boyd explained, "At the time that this development was platted there was a requirement for eight percent of the land to be public parkland. The city at that time (1999) allowed the riverbed to be the public parkland. We should have gotten real parks. That never should have been allowed. You certainly have a right to be in the publicly owned part of this (creek)."

In most, if not all, cases these public boundaries extend beyond just the creek-bed itself.

There were reports of a few creekside residents yelling at kids playing in the creek.