Local residents are so fed up that the cycle path on Echtenseweg is still not finished after years that they have filed an official complaint against the mayor and aldermen with the municipal ombudsman. The ombudsman of the municipality of De Wolden agrees with them and declares the complaint well-founded.
A year ago, local residents also signed up. In a letter to the municipality of De Wolden they appealed: ‘Complete the cycle path between Ruinen and Echten’. The first plans for the cycle path were made ten years ago, but the last part is still missing.
Two parts of the cycle path have now been completed: a section along the Echtenseweg near Ruinen towards the N375 and a section between the Van Echten holiday park and the railway crossing at Echten. The part that is still missing is in between. The fact that cyclists have to take to the road again creates a more unsafe situation than before the two parts of the cycle path were constructed, says local resident Arjen Pauwels, on behalf of the Hees neighborhood.
The municipality informed RTV Drenthe last year that it was still working on purchasing the right parts of land. “There are negotiations we need to settle first.” As soon as this has been achieved and the permits have been obtained, the final section will be constructed.
“However, it is difficult to make a schedule for this, because we are dependent on third parties,” the municipality said at the time. “If purchasing is not successful, we will have to consider other steps.”
But the status of that process is not clear to local residents, says Pauwels. “There is no communication at all. Promises are made that we will receive a response within six weeks, but then that does not happen.”
That is why Pauwels, together with local resident Peter Berendse, went to the ombudsman of the municipality of De Wolden last July. Together they filed a formal complaint. The ombudsman declares this complaint, about the lack of a substantive response from the council, to be well-founded. After the council informed the ombudsman that it would regularly inform local residents, the ombudsman asked the council for additional information.
But there was no response from the council, the ombudsman wrote to Pauwels. “Partly for this reason, I assume that you have presented an accurate picture of the situation in your complaint, and I consider your complaint to be well-founded,” the ombudsman said in his response.
Pauwels finds it unacceptable that the ombudsman has not received a response to his questions. “It would actually be hilarious if it weren’t so deeply sad. I think it’s fear, arrogance or incompetence. I don’t know which is worst.”
According to Pauwels, there is only one thing to do if the municipality does not reach an agreement with the landowner. “Expropriation. If the landowner does not cooperate, as a council you have little choice but to expropriate.”
The municipality of De Wolden said in a response that contact with the landowner was “difficult” until recently, “due to illness”. “But that is now underway and we are confident that we will reach a good solution with the landowner. So the process we were already in will be continued.”
The municipality of De Wolden does not currently see expropriation as the only way out. “We are currently not in a phase where expropriation is the only remaining option. There is contact with the landowner, consultations are taking place. If we ever end up in that phase, expropriation could become an option.”
The municipality also says that the council is aware that in retrospect “they could have communicated more often in an official manner with the group of local residents. There have been regular informal contacts between individual local residents and the alderman, but we as a municipality could have acted more proactively in this regard.”