There has been considerable progress in the cleanup of vagrant camps along two of Albany’s multi-use paths. You cannot help but notice this if you go past these places every few days.
The Cox Creek Path in Albany is about one-third of a mile long and runs from Simpson Park to Salem Avenue. It used to be a scenic segment of Albany’s system of walking and cycling paths. This spring the nature of the scenery has dramatically changed.
A few weeks ago, the north end of the Periwinkle Bike Path behind Lowe’s was a mess, with a big mound of bicycle parts and other trash piled up against the wall. Now that spot on the path is clean, or at least it was when I went through there Sunday on the bike.
This, a garbage dump on a public trail, is still the exception in Albany. What can be done to keep scenes like this from multiplying as they have in other cities in Oregon and up and down the West Coast?
On Facebook last week, someone posted photos of a mess on the Periwinkle Bike Path in Albany. The mess was still there Sunday afternoon, when I went to take a look.
In Benton County we’re at least several years away from completing the Albany-Corvallis Bike Trail, so in order to visualize the thing we have to ride other paths, such as SART, the Santa Ana River Trail in California’s Orange County.
Before and after on the Cox Creek Path
Three weeks ago, on June 5, I ran the above photo to illustrate the difficult challenge the Albany parks crew has every spring in trying to keep weeds under control along the city’s bike and walking paths.
Tags: Albany parks, bike paths, park maintenance, walking paths, weed control