Meeting with Wake County Delegates

We met with 13 members of the NC delegates representing Wake County(to include our senators and house representatives) to discuss our concerns and ask for their help. We want to especially thank Rep. Jennifer Weiss who has been very responsive to our concerns to date and notified us of this meeting. After this meeting, Ty Harrell has asked that we recontact him--which we will do. Stay tuned.

Please see below for the essence of the information we presented at the meeting:
After parking was eliminated from the Reedy Creek Road and Graylyn entrances to Umstead State Park, we have had constant conversations with the community of fellow park users (runners, hikers, mountain bikers, neighbor, families and dog walkers) regarding concerns about the loss of safe, convenient parking and access to the park. Access Umstead, a group of 5 concerned individuals, was formed in late 2007 to provide a forum for our numerous supporters to voice their concerns. We created the Access Umstead petition at www.thepetitionsite.com/petition/609803273 with the goal of the organizers representing these voices (that now exceed 1450 people) to leaders who can make a difference.

The problem:

The “official” entrances to the park were established many years ago when Umstead was surrounded by rural area. The demographics of the area and park users has changed dramatically in the past 10 years. Did you know that Umstead was featured in the national Runner’s World magazine as a scenic place to run that someone should not miss? The growing active community represents an affluent, highly educated set.

With the paving of the roads and elimination of parking, Raleigh’s parking and access was reduced from three safe, convenient accesses to just two. One of these areas requires users to park near the NC Art Museum; cross Blue Ridge Road (not pedestrian friendly) and then walk or bike more than two miles to get to the park gate. The only remaining access with parking in Raleigh is approximately 7 miles away, off of an already congested and not pedestrian friendly, Glenwood Ave/Hwy 70, and requiring additional driving once users enter the park to actually get to a parking area. We continue to speak with our supporters of over 1450 runners, mountain bikers, hikers, families, neighbors and dog walkers that have either been unable to enjoy Umstead State Park at all or not as frequently due to the extra time involved.

Fortunately, our voices were heard regarding an access in Cary slated to have road paving. In this case, NCDOT agreed to delay paving until the City of Cary worked out a solution for parking.

The solution:
Our group is working diligently to reclaim these entrances or others offering safe and convenient access to ensure that Umstead State Park remains a safe and easily accessible public resource to all citizens in the future. We need your help to get all of the state agencies involved working together to develop a plan to resolve this problem quickly or at least in a timely manner.