Mar 20

Join us at the California Trails & Greenways Conference!

The California Trails & Greenways conference, held from March 28-30 in Palm Springs, CA provides high-quality education and networking opportunities for urban, rural, and backcountry trail professionals. Register here to join leading trail experts for training and discussions on the latest advances in trail design, construction, maintenance, interpretation, volunteerism, and management. Explore new, collaborative opportunities and engage in productive, meaningful, and inspiring dialog. Alta is a proud sponsor, and we’re looking forward to seeing you at the following sessions.

Resilient Trails

In the age of the climate crisis, how can we plan and design resilient trails to help mitigate climate change and provide maximum user comfort and safety? Our planet is getting hotter, resulting in more frequent and more destructive floods, extreme heat and wildfires, severe storms, drought, and sea-level rise. Join us to hear how trails across California are providing critical infrastructure in building communities that can better adapt and be more resilient to future hazards. We’ll also dive into case studies where trails are incorporating multi-benefit strategies for addressing more frequent and more extreme heat events, ecosystem health, drought, food shortages, and community connectivity. The case studies include: a Level of Comfort tool developed for the Los Angeles River Path which uses climate change-related risks to path users to help inform design solutions to provide protection from extreme heat events; a community orchard, wildlife bridge, and native habitat restoration for the Park to Playa Trail; and the conservation and restoration of urban open spaces at the Taylor Yard near downtown Los Angeles and hilltops in Northeast Los Angeles.

Alta Speakers:

Emily Duchon, Principal, Vice President and California Regional Manager

James Powell, Principal, California Design Lead

Moving People with Data: Bicycle Highways & Urban Trails

This session will explore how public agencies in the Bay Area are using qualitative personal stories and quantitative data to enhance and plan regionally significant active transportation corridors that also meet the needs of disadvantaged communities.
Caltrans District 4 and the Metropolitan Transportation Commission (MTC) are crafting a vision for long-distance urban trails and “bike highways” in the Bay Area. A bike highway is a high-quality, uninterrupted, long-distance bikeway that provides total separation from motor vehicles. They accommodate high volumes of people traveling long distances on bicycles (more than 3 miles) by connecting users to major destinations, employment centers, and transit hubs. Panelists will discuss how qualitative data gathered from public engagement combined with quantitative suitability and feasibility analyses contributed to the Bay Area Bike Highway Study. They will also share similar approaches on the Richmond-San Rafael Bridge Path Pilot Study and the Active Transportation Origin-Destination Study, which conducted over 700 intercept surveys for people traveling across four major Bay Area bridges and trails. The survey compared field counts to permanent counters, evaluated how respondents of color differed in their needs from the majority of white respondents, and identified opportunities for quick-build solutions to encourage more use. Alta served as the prime consultant for both the Bay Area Bike Highway Study and the Active Transportation Origin-Destination Study.

Alta Speaker:

Jeff Knowles, Principal