Bike trail, Port data center on collision course

No sooner had the repaving of the Ozaukee Interurban Trail started than officials were told that the project north of Port Washington will likely be put on hold until next year due to complications stemming from the oncoming development of the data center in the City of Port Washington and conflicts with the Union Pacific Railroad near Belgium.

“This all came about in the last month,” Ozaukee County Planning and Parks Director Andrew Struck told members of the Natural Resources Committee last week.

Repaving and widening of the rural portions of the Ozaukee Interurban Trail began in July and the portion of the trail from the Milwaukee River in Grafton to Port is largely completed, Struck said.

But plans to begin repaving north of Port Washington are now on hold because development of the data center is expected to start soon.

That will require a rerouting of the trail near Highland Drive just north of I-43 and tearing up the trail where electrical lines will be installed underground and overhead, Struck said.

“It doesn’t make sense to repave the bike trail for the first time in 25 years and then tear it up a few months later,” Struck told the committee. 

Port Washington Mayor Ted Neitzke warned supervisors in early July that rerouting the trail near Highland Drive and through Knellsville was likely and that a new bike bridge may even be necessary.

Meanwhile, railroad officials in California swooped in after the paving project had already been approved and claimed that the bike trail encroached on the railroad right of way and that the county must pay for flaggers to keep pavers off their tracks. 

The railroad originally claimed about 200 feet of the trail was on railroad property, but Struck said a new survey showed that just five feet were.

Struck said the county is planning on rerouting those five feet and also dealing with objections Union Pacific has with a spur in Belgium that serves local businesses.

“We need to have a discussion with the village (of Belgium),” he said.

Some supervisors suggested in July that problems with Union Pacific were political  and the railroad was flexing its muscle based on past conflicts with the county.

Asked last week if the railroad is difficult to work with, Struck said: “Yeah. They have their own process. Let’s put it that way.”

The trail will be disrupted in any case by We Energies, which will need to bury electrical lines to serve a substation to serve the data center, and American Transmission Company, which will be bringing in overhead transmission lines from the north and the west.

“Ironically, from everywhere except Port Washington,” he said.

With all the work taking place, Struck said trail users should expect closures and detours.

The Ozaukee Interurban Trail is a major tourist draw, attracting up to half a million users annually, many from Chicago, Madison and beyond, officials say.

The $1.2 million trail repaving project is funded by a state Department of Transportation grant, but the cost of flaggers — $20,000 to $30,000 — is not covered by the grant and delaying its completion until next year also will drive up the cost, which my have to be borne by the county, Struck said.

“We’re working with the state and the contractor seems to be willing to work with us. But it means a change order. The price will go up. We shouldn’t lose the grant, however,” he said.

Struck had no estimate of how high the cost might increase.

The trail is named after and follows the path of the Interurban Electric Railway, which operated from 1908 to 1951 and ran from Milwaukee to Sheboygan.

In 1998, Ozaukee County and several municipalities received state funding to lease the land from Wisconsin Electric, now We Energies, which owns the old Interurban railroad bed, and completed the trail.