Council backs Davenport Street route for long-awaited pedestrian path

Four years after a west side resident first stood before the Rhinelander Common Council — infant son in arms — to plead for a safe way to walk or bike out of his neighborhood, the council voted unanimously June 8 to pursue a sidewalk and multi-use path along Davenport Street as the preferred solution for long-sought pedestrian connectivity to the West Hill area.
The 8-0 vote came after Mark Barden of Town & Country Engineering laid out three options for connecting West Hill to the rest of the city and recommended the Davenport Street route as the most practical and cost-effective path forward.
Ben Meyer, who introduced the walking path concept to the council in 2021, set the tone during public comment. He described the far west side of Rhinelander — encompassing West Hill, West Wind and a section of Balsam Street — as an island cut off from the rest of the city.
“There is no safe way to bike or walk to the rest of the city that we live in,” Meyer said. “The only way to get there is on Davenport Street, and biking or walking on the far west side of Davenport Street is not safe. There are no sidewalks, there’s a lot of traffic, and it goes fast, and there’s trucks. It’s not safe for kids — frankly, it’s not safe for most adults.”
Meyer traced the project’s slow progress, noting that in October 2023 the council unanimously approved — on a motion by alderman Tom Barnett, seconded by alderperson Carrie Mikalauski — directing the city to create a walking path between West Hill Dr. and Lois Street, with a completion deadline of spring 2024. In February 2024, the council unanimously approved spending nearly $10,000 for Town and Country to study the options.

“Two years and four months later, we have something tangible on paper with a dollar figure,” Meyer said, adding that the eight-month-old he had been holding during his first appearance before the council is now four years old. “My point is not to cast blame or make anyone feel like they did anything wrong.”
Instead, Meyer framed the project as an opportunity. “You have the ability to counter any narrative that says municipal governments can’t get stuff done,” he told the council. “You have an ability to counter the narrative that Rhinelander is not a friendly place for families, and for young people, and for people that care about walking and biking.”
Meyer also connected the path to a separate rezoning proposal discussed earlier in the meeting involving a development near West Wind. “If you are even considering rezoning that area to allow more families to live there, it is imperative that you not put them on an island as well,” he said.
Why not the direct route?
The most direct connection — a short trail linking West Hill to Phillip Street through an existing informal walking path — turned out to be riddled with problems. A land survey revealed the existing path does not run on city property, meaning the city would need to acquire land before any improvements could be made. Shifting the route south onto city-owned land runs the path dangerously close to a nearby pond, leaving insufficient room for a standard eight-foot asphalt trail.
That left a boardwalk as the only viable option for that corridor — at an estimated cost of $372,000, or roughly $1,200 per linear foot. The expense stems largely from the need for helical piles to stabilize the structure and achieve ADA compliance. Barden noted boardwalk decking typically requires board replacement within five to ten years, compared to a 25-to-30-year lifespan for asphalt or concrete.
“It would cost you less money to connect Phillip Street to West Hill — just put a road in,” Barden said, noting a road connection would run approximately $290,000, setting aside wetland and property acquisition issues.
Meyer, for his part, said he was surprised by the boardwalk estimate. “That 400-foot stretch between West Hill and Lois Street — the city already owns, by the way — and the estimate for a combined asphalt path and boardwalk was $372,000,” he said. “That’s $1,000 a linear foot. That’s certainly not my preference.”
A second option — routing a path up Church Street through the north side — would require acquiring a private easement, introducing both cost uncertainty and potential legal complications depending on the landowner’s cooperation.
The Davenport option
Option three, the Davenport Street route, calls for adding sidewalk along Davenport Street at an estimated $124,000, combined with a new multi-use path from Crescent Street to West Hill estimated at $170,000 — totaling roughly $294,000, about $75,000 less than the boardwalk alternative.
The proposal also dovetails with the city’s planned Spruce Street reconstruction project. A mill-and-overlay project on Davenport from the south lift station to Maple Street is already planned for this year, and a utility construction alternate on part of Davenport is under consideration. Designing the sidewalk and path improvements alongside the Spruce Street project would allow the city to coordinate construction and avoid tearing out new work later.
Barden recommended waiting until next year to bid the path work so it can be incorporated into the Spruce Street area design. Mayor Kris Hanus concurred, noting that doing the path work separately this year and reconstructing the road next year could result in unnecessary costs.
Alderman Gerald Anderson called the Davenport route the obvious choice, saying it takes pedestrians directly downtown rather than routing them through Phillip Street. “That’s really the best solution,” he said.
Hanus also noted that the multi-use path could eventually be extended to connect with city-owned property leading toward the Kemp Street bike trail, the softball fields and Hansen Lake Road — and potentially out to U.S. Highway 47 if the West Wind housing development project comes to fruition.
Funding still to be determined
The council’s vote directed city administration to move forward with planning and grant-seeking for the Davenport option, but funding is not yet secured. The city’s PRAT (premiere resort area tax) fund could cover the Davenport reconstruction component, but the available balance won’t be clearly known until February.
Barden noted the city could pursue LRIP (Local Roads Improvement Program) grant funding for the path component, though the current application window has passed. The city has received approximately $400,000 through LRIP in each of the last four or five cycles.
The city’s next capital borrowing cycle — roughly $1 million borrowed every two years — is expected to occur in 2027, which Hanus suggested as another potential vehicle for funding the trail.
Alderman Steven Jopek urged the council not to let the project stall again over funding uncertainties. “I would really hate it if we get to bidding or whatever, and then we just don’t have enough funding to run this, and then we go another year without the path,” he said. Jopek also asked staff to quietly reach out to the owner of the private property involved in the Church Street easement option — which city administrator Patrick Reagan indicated had already begun — to keep a backup plan available if needed.