The Finance Committee met 06/09/2025. One of the items they discussed was the request to approve the development of a corridor study and a comprehensive bike and pedestrian plan for County Highway KK between John Street and County Highway 55 and apply for federal grants to cover 80%.
The committee ended up voting 5-0 to recommend the item be approved.
I’ve prepared a transcript of the discussion for download:
The total cost of the corridor study was estimated to be $800,000 with 80% of that being covered by federal grants and the remaining 20% being covered by local county and municipal governments along the KK corridor. Appleton’s costs were estimated to be $18,348.
The total cost of the bike and pedestrian plan study was estimated to be $200,000 with the City of Appleton having to cover $40,000 of that.
Appleton has a bike plan that was adopted in 2010 as well as a trails master plan. City staff wanted to update those and make sure they were integrated with each other and cohesive. City staff ad already identified key target areas that they would like to work on installing traffic calming and safety improvement measures, and they believed the new bicycle and pedestrian plan would give them the tools and guidance needed to implement and integrate those measure into existing roadways.
As staff looked into that bike and pedestrian plan, they became away of a need for a corridor study of County Highway KK, a section of road that spans 2 counties and 4 municipalities. The corridor study would analyze things like traffic and potential wetlands to help determine how to make safety improvements along the corridor.
Alderperson Nate Wolff (District 12) felt that the $800,000 price tag seemed high and asked for confirmation that it was a reasonable amount of money to pay for such a study.
Deputy Director Pete Neuberger said the corridor in question was 4 ½ miles long, spanning multiple jurisdictions. Additionally, it connected with Highway 55 and Highway 441 which were both high traffic volume interchanges. The scope of the study was much larger than anything Appleton would tackle on its own.
Additionally, Director of Public Works Laura Jungwirth said they wanted to look at the corridor in its entirety instead of stopping at the boundaries of any given municipality so that improvements that one municipality made did not cause bottle necks or traffic flow issues in the corridor beyond their municipal borders.
The committee voted 5-0 to recommend the item be approved.
View full meeting details and video here: https://cityofappleton.legistar.com/MeetingDetail.aspx?ID=1304178&GUID=64E04F9C-9F78-4027-A703-5E2CF6C7664B
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