Towards a Regional Shared-use Path System

I’ve spent the last two years thinking seriously about transportation in Peachtree City, from how it works today to how it could work better and serve more residents.

Every few years, concerned residents bring up essentially the same question: who should be allowed to use Peachtree City’s shared-use paths.

My framing of the concern, because I used to share it, goes something like this: people from outside Peachtree City are streaming in on their golf carts. This leads to excess wear of the paths and causes path congestion problems, and Peachtree City residents pay for a system freely used by others. With ongoing growth, especially outside our city, we need to control things before they get out of control, and things may be out of control already.

Past political candidates have run on “preserving Peachtree City’s paths for our residents,” and City Council created a policy whereby those who do not pay Peachtree City property taxes, meaning non-residents, must pay a $235 per year user fee plus a $15 registration. Contrast this with the $15 per year registration residents pay.

I’d like to offer a different viewpoint on the Peachtree City path system access and create a vision for the future, but I will start with debunking some of the misconceptions about the path system and offering alternative viewpoints.

Without any data to back up the decision, City  Council closed access to Kedron Hills from Tyrone due to residents’ concerns, but after public pressure against the decision, the paths to Peachtree City were opened long enough to do a traffic study, and the results were very few carts were traveling into Kedron Hills.

Over the 32-week study an average of 159 carts per week or 23 per day traveled on Crabapple Lane between Tyrone and Kedron Hills. The peak weekly average was 216 carts or about 31 per day.

This is hardly “streaming in.” Perception was not reality.

In speaking with Peachtree City Public Work’s officials, the top reason paths need repaving is the tree roots that grow underneath and deform the path. We’ve all seen this. Golf carts simply aren’t heavy enough to wear out the paths.

Current city policy is to cut back trees when repaving and create a 4-foot buffer on both sides of the path to reduce tree roots and, therefore, repaving frequency and increase visibility and safety on the paths.

The challenge with this policy is Peachtree City residents love our Tree City USA and complain, in some cases justly so, about tree removal so the City has to balance reducing repaving frequency, promoting safety, and keeping trees.

Sections of the path system that have limited use still need repaving due to tree root growth, and this means more frequent expenditures of taxpayer money.

In other words carts are not wearing out paths, necessitating repaving.

For several years new path construction and existing path repaving has not been paid for by property taxes. Impact fees from new construction and requiring developers to add path system access pay for many of the new path miles while the countywide 1% SPLOST covers repaving.

This is key: without SPLOST, no path repaving takes place, and nobody wants their property taxes increased.

The justification for limiting system access because our property taxes directly fund repaving is not valid. People outside Peachtree City and even Fayette County are paying for repaving.

I understand that if we didn’t use SPLOST for repaving, we could use it for something else, but that doesn’t change the fact that path repaving is paid for, in part, by non-residents of Peachtree City.

Thinking about system access and cart registration, I’d like to offer an analogy of how current policy treats non-residents.

If I drive my car to Tyrone to visit a friend, I don’t pay a Tyrone automobile non-resident user fee to drive there, and likewise, if my friend comes to visit me, he doesn’t pay a Peachtree City automobile user fee. Furthermore, both cities take care of repaving their own residential streets, and nobody gets too upset when non-residents use them.

But change “automobile” to “golf cart,” and somehow the logic changes- this is confusing.

When I was a kid and even now, lunch on the first day of any road trip is leftovers my family and I couldn’t manage to finish before departing. Around noon, we look for a park with a picnic table to enjoy a meal together.

I’ve eaten in lots of parks built and maintained by other municipalities, and not once has anyone ever approached my family or me and asked to show proof of residency or pay a fee, but this is how we’re treating our neighboring communities.

Several of the residents who are deeply concerned about path congestion, unfortunately, live next to the busiest sections of the path system. Their perception is real, and enforcement is clearly needed to take care of some of the bad and illegal behaviors.

But their perception is not reality on the vast majority of the path system.

An additional reality is that Fayette County has provided access to Starr’s Mill High School for golf cart commuters. Imagine how enraged Peachtree City parents would be if they had to pay $235 per year to access county paths to let their high schoolers commute to Starr’s Mill.

The path tunnel recently built under Redwine Road was a Fayette County project, not Peachtree City’s.

Here’s my vision for creation of a Peachtree City-Tyrone-Senoia-Fayette County shared-use path system that would allow carts registered by owners in their own municipalities or the county to drive anywhere in the system.

Here are the benefits for Peachtree City residents.

I live in the center of Peachtree City, near Peachtree Parkway and McIntosh Trail, and I can go lots of places within 20 minutes on a cart. South takes me to work or Braelinn Kroger. West takes me to Mimi’s Good Food. North takes me to City Hall or Fresh Market.

But residents in Wilshire Village and Kedron Village are landlocked due to no developed path system other than to the north and south, respectively.

I would like residents of Tyrone to keep their $235 per year user fees and contribute that to building out their own path system. It’s clear Tyrone residents want a path system; otherwise, they wouldn’t be coming to Peachtree City.

A developing path system in Tyrone gives Kedron Village residents more options for recreation, retail shopping, and restaurants.

For residents of Wilshire, connectivity to Senioa is even more compelling as downtown Senoia seems to have something going on all the time, in addition to all its great restaurants and shops.

Wilshire Pavilion to downtown Senioa is only 4 miles, about 20 minutes on a golf cart. At peak periods, parking in Senoia is a challenge, and if golf cart connectivity and accessibility were prioritized in Senoia, it alleviates both congested parking and roads.

But, you ask, where does this regional golf cart connectivity stop? It is self-limiting due to several factors.

First, outside Peachtree City, Tyrone, Senoia, and Fayette County along Redwine Road are more rural areas. There isn’t sufficient population density to justify path system construction.

Second cart speed is limited to 20 mph. I never take my cart to Kedron because it takes too long, and the route includes a lot of switchbacks. If a trip takes more than 25 or 30 minutes by cart, I’m going by car.

My commute to work by cart is about five minutes longer than by car, and if the difference were much greater, I’d likely opt for the car more often.

I suspect many feel this way.

Even if a cart path were available along Redwine Road from downtown Fayetteville to Wilshire Village, the distance is 10 miles. Travelling at top speed, the trip takes 30 minutes, likely much longer. That’s a big investment in one’s time, likely one most people wouldn’t make.

Third, carts are range-limited by battery life. A lead-acid battery cart, the most common type, may have a range up to about 40 miles. A one-way trip of more than an hour requires charging at destination in order to make it home.

The same range anxiety people have when purchasing a fully electric automobile applies to golf carts too.

Peachtree City’s path system is one of the most beloved features of our community, but protecting it doesn’t require walling ourselves off from our neighbors.

The data shows non-residents are not flooding our paths. Tree roots, not golf carts, cause the majority of path wear, and SPLOST, not property taxes, pays for repaving.

Peachtree City, Tyrone, Senoia, and Fayette County are already connected physically and commercially, and instead of treating non‑residents as uninvited guests, we can treat them as partners in building a more connected region.

This is the future Peachtree City deserves, and the one we should be planning for.

Author’s disclosure: I am a member and chair of the Peachtree City Transportation Advisory Group (TAG), a team of volunteer residents tasked with advising City staff and Mayor and Council. The opinions in this article are solely my own and do not reflect any official position of the Peachtree City Council, City staff, or TAG.