Vic Lebsock, Raleigh's greenway planner for most of the past 22 years, acknowledges he doesn't use the city's greenways as much as he'd like; four to six times a month on average.
But Lebsock's time and effort on the unbuilt corridors of the greenway system has grown the city's vision into a reality, creating a place where ecologically sensitive floodplains have been protected while providing an expansive network of paved trails for the public to escape to, whether they jog, ride bikes or walk.
City and county officials broke ground this month on an ambitious project, the 28-mile Neuse River Greenway Trail, which will ultimately run down to the Johnston County line. Work began last week.
"It's a relief that it started - it's excitement that you're going to see the results of two or three years of planning work," Lebsock says.
While the construction was funded with bonds approved in a 2007 referendum, Lebsock has been the main person planning the greenway since the initial idea - a series of parks along the river linked by greenway - was approved in 1996.
Before he was able to start working with engineering consultants a few years back, he, along with the city's real estate department, was busy assembling the property and easements needed. He wrote federal grants that have given the city more than 1,000 acres of land along the way.
Lebsock, 60, wears wire rim glasses and a neat haircut and mustache with highlights of gray in his brown hair. On days such as Thursday, when he tromps through the mud, he wears a tie - and hiking boots.
He was reared on the eastern Colorado plains, studied geology at Colorado State but lost his job as a geologist for the oil companies in the 1980s when the economy took a downturn.
He changed careers, going back to school for a master's degree in landscape architecture from the University of Colorado at Denver and became Raleigh's only greenway planner in 1988.
Donna, his wife of 33 years, says he's grown to love the job, one that requires lots of interaction with people, though he's a "solitary" person.
"He really believes in what he's doing," says Donna Lebsock, her husband's best friend.
When Lebsock came to Raleigh, the city was adjusting its vision for greenways.
A change in vision
In the mid-1970s, the focus was on short, neighborhood circuits. But as Lebsock arrived, the philosophy shifted to a vast network of trails, which now stretches 63 miles and could reach 100 miles within the next four years.
"It's safe to say that without Vic, it wouldn't be where it is today," says Lebsock's boss, Dick Bailey, the department's development design supervisor.
Lebsock is just thankful there's been a will.
"It's been the citizens of Raleigh and the City Council that's allowed me to do it," he says.
But park projects are often met with opposition from neighboring property owners.
'Totally exuberant'
"As a staff person, he can only be so much of an advocate, his role is to design and plan," says former Raleigh city councilor Benson Kirkman, a longtime proponent of greenways. "But it really helps to have somebody that is totally exuberant."
The sometimes frustrating public process of park planning wore down Lebsock for a while. He quit in 1998 but returned less than two years later after planning greenways for a private firm.
"I came back relishing the interests of the public, regardless of what position they may be taking," he says.
In securing one stretch of easement, Lebsock approached the Bedford at Falls River subdivision, where concerns arose over a public parking lot the city needed to construct.
The city agreed to hide the parking with a buffer, satisfying most of the residents.
"He's passionate about what he does," says Dennis Kolb, president of the Bedford homeowner's association. "But he's able to look at citizens' concerns and does what he can to eliminate them."
It's still not always easy for Lebsock. He had a heart attack a couple of years ago, and with no risk factors present, stress was suspected.
He tries to not keep frustrations bottled up, and he's taken to a routine. He exercises three to five times each week.
"I still take work home, but I do put it aside, too," he says.
High expectations
Even if the Neuse River Trail is completed on its current four-year schedule - the city has secured only half of the greenway's $30 million price tag - it will have taken roughly 15 years to become fully realized.
"Those of us who are really adamant greenway supporters would say we would have liked for it to be completed sooner," Kirkman says. But he sympathizes with Lebsock due to the challenges he faces.
"Having to fight the budget battles and having sat at the council table, I also understand some of it," Kirkman says.
Bailey says a project of such magnitude takes time. Lebsock has done his part so that the project was ready when everything else lined up, he says, including the fact that Raleigh has only recently grown in that direction.
"We would all love to see major visions and plans like the Neuse River Corridor be done more quickly, but I don't think there's been anything short of a heroic effort to implement the visions of the plan," Bailey says.
Lebsock says he's one of his own critics; he has high expectations for himself.
"Sometimes the efforts I put in are not as fast as they could be," he says.
But things are speeding up.
The same bonds that have financed construction for the project also tripled the planning staff. Now, instead of getting pulled away to work on other things, he's supported by two planners.
"It allows me to focus on the Neuse River," Lebsock says.
