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Terre Haute Opens Indiana-Shaped Trail - December 16, 2004
Indiana Reaches 150 miles of Open Rail-Trail - December 3, 2004
Monon Trail North Update - November 30, 2004
Marquette Greenway Plan Presented - November 18, 2004
Henry County Trail Group Nets $450k Grant for Cross-State Trail - October 24, 2004
Delphi Volunteers Rebuild Bridge, Clear Future Monon Trail - October 7, 2004
Monon Trail and Midland Trace Plan Approved - September 21, 2004
Cardinal Greenway gets Grant to Connect Richmond and Webster - September 21, 2004
Fledgling Nickel Plate Trail Group nets $850k for 8-mile trail - September 8, 2004
Transportation Enhancement Awards given to Trail Projects for 2004 - September 7, 2004
Chesterton Plans Trail Connections - September 2, 2004
State Agencies Help Save Rail and Trail - August 19, 2004
Fort Wayne Area Establishes New Trail Group - August 19, 2004
Terre Haute Opens Unique Indiana-Shaped Trail - December 3, 2004
Here's a riddle: what goes around the Indiana, on its way to going across Indiana? Answer: the Indiana Interpretative Trail, a one-mile trail loop around the Indiana State University stadium in the shape of the state, which begun in October and will officially open this week. The trail complements a 2-mile westward extension of Terre Haute's section of the National Road Heritage Trail (NRHT) from 13th Street into the ISU campus. A portion of the funding was donated from Indiana State University, which designed the trail through Fourth Street. The trail extension starts at the previous western end of the NRHT, at 13th Street and Tippecanoe Avenue, and now goes west to Spruce, north on Ninth and west to Tippecanoe and down Fourth Street to Cherry Street.
The NRHT is also slated to be extended another half mile to the east in 2005. The work is to be completed by mid-2005 and will involve a 0.5-mile extension of the trail from the Twigg rest Area to Chamberlain Road. Development of the new 2.0-acre Jones Trailhead will follow the trail extension.
The National Road Heritage Trail
in Terre Haute is at the western end of this 150-mile cross-state
trail project, coordinated by NRHT, Inc.
Planning and design meetings for
another trail in Terre Haute's trail network, the Historic Ohio Boulevard-Deming
Park Pathway, is ongoing and has included a series of advisory committee meetings,
meetings with citizen groups, and on-site inspections. The future
north-south pathway will intersect
the NRHT at Brown Avenue, connecting to Deming Park at its south end.
Indiana Reaches 150 miles
of Open Rail-Trail - December
3, 2004
Nearly doubling its tally in only 5 years, Indiana reached a numeric milestone this fall as it surpassed 150 miles of open rail-trail. Trail mileage tallies have been used as a metric of an area's quality-of-life index, as interest in alternate transportation, fitness, and "play where you live" amenities grow in popularity. Rail-trails reflect a resolve and commitment to build livable communities.
Rail-trails have typically been one of the most popular, lowest-cost amenities to develop but also one of the more challenging in many states. Indiana has suffered from unfavorable lawsuits and legislation, as well as an unusual hands-off state government policy which has proliferated a remarkable number of small, local trail-support groups in an attempt to compensate. Indiana is also unusual in the length of its trails - most are short, local trails (less than 3 miles) contained within municipal boundaries, reflecting the challenges of bringing the benefits of trails to rural communities. The longest continuous Indiana rail-trail is the 20-mile Cardinal Greenway in Delaware County, centered at Muncie.
Despite their enormous popularity and well-studied benefits, rail-trails still would not exist without persistent citizen activism. Behind every open trail is a group of dedicated local volunteers coordinating everything from fundraising to landscaping.
Although Indiana's mileage pales in comparison to Illinois and Ohio, each with about 500 miles of open rail-trail, several hundred miles of active projects are awaiting funding for construction and the total could conceivably double again, or even triple, in the next five-year period. Michigan, Minnesota and Wisconsin lead the 50 states with over 1200 open miles each, where many of the trails are undeveloped and in sparsely populated areas.
The first rail-trails around Indiana and other states typically followed a functional, unadorned design, but the past few years have seen the development of highly designed, state-of-the-art trails which function as major public spaces, community focal points and expressions of local culture. This evolution of trail design reflects the exponential growth in popularity over the same period. People are seeking out communities with rail-trails and many have come to expect them in choosing places to live.
See the complete list of Indiana Rail-Trails to date, shown roughly in chronological order.
The 15-mile Monon Trail is attracting about 2 million users
annually.
Trails of more than 10 miles attract many out-of-county users.
Monon Trail North Update
- November 30, 2004
When is the Monon Trail going to reach north into Westfield? The answer to one of the most often-asked questions about rail-trails in central Indiana continued to materialize this fall, as more pieces of the plan came together. Four organizations are currently working on the trail to extend it 11 miles from 146th Street to SR47 in Sheridan: the Town of Westfield, Washington Township Parks, Hamilton County Parks, and the Town of Sheridan.
The unofficially
open Monon Trail in Biddle Park, Sheridan
Marquette Greenway Plan
Presented - November 18, 2004
Plans to turn over more than 80 percent of the Lake Michigan shoreline from the Illinois border to Burns Waterway for public use, including over 2,000 acres of parkland and connecting trails, were presented to the public at Purdue Calumet Wednesday night. The ambitious and long-term plan proposed last year by US Rep. Pete Visclosky has been commissioned by five cities: Hammond, Whiting, East Chicago, Gary and Portage. The 21-mile stretch of shoreline would be developed slowly, in stages, and at the discretion of each city. Currently a network of bike paths is emerging to cross through the region from Chicago to Michigan, but it is well inland from the lake and is expected to be completed in the next few years.
Read a summary of the presentation in the Gary Post-Tribune or see uploaded photos by Bob Huffman. The Calumet Citizens for Connecting Communities, the trail support group for Northwest Indiana, also maintains a web page of Marquette Greenway articles.
Henry County Trail Group
Nets $450k Grant for Cross-State Trail
- October 24, 2004
Henry County, population of about 50,000 and located between Indy and Richmond, is poised to become one of the state's leading areas in rail-trail development, with 30 miles of trail currently under development and another 15 miles proposed. Jeff Ray of the Raintree Trails Committee and Healthy Communities' chair Dr. Helen Steussey are leading this remarkable effort which would bring the trail network to nearly every town in the county. The rail-trails would cover portions of five different rail lines and make connections with the cross-state National Road Heritage Trail project, a future section of the Cardinal Greenway, downtown New Castle, and the city of Anderson. Ray approaches the endeavor with cautious enthusiasm. "We're excited about all of these potential trails, but we're going to need plenty of help getting them all done. Having this incredible network would really make Henry County a better place to live and even a recreational destination."
This modest-sized county has thus far raised nearly $2 million in grants and other means to bring the trail network from a good idea to a serious endeavor involving numerous partnerships. Henry County has been fortunate to have a healthy combination of strong volunteerism and community, cooperative landowners, large stretches of former rail corridor owned by one company, and involvement in several multi-county trail projects.
The most recent grant of $450,000 from INDOT and IDNR will go toward land acquisition along the National Road Heritage Trail corridor, a former Pennsylvania rail line along the south edge of the county. One goal of Raintree Trails is to become a part of the 150-mile cross-state trail which parallels the historic National Road.
Bridges along the
National Road Heritage Trail corridor in Henry County
Another rail corridor under development includes a stretch of a former New York Central line from New Castle northeast to the Wilbur Wright Fish & Wildlife Area, appropriately named the Wilbur Wright Trail. Much of the scenic route will follow the Little Blue River. The trail will originate at the new YMCA and connect to the Wilbur Wright Fish & Wildlife area. The Wilbur Wright Trail project received a $950,000 Transportation Enhancement Grant from INDOT in 2003 and should get at least the first 2-3 miles completed. Eventually the trail will reach Mooreland and the Cardinal Greenway at the town of Losantville.
This same rail corridor is also being developed southwest of New Castle, where it will be known as the Wooly Bear Trail, after the caterpillar of the same name. This project received $24,000 from the Indiana "Heritage Trust in 2003 and will connect to the town of Shirley near the county border.
Six miles of the former Honey Creek Railroad, now completely abandoned from just outside New Castle to Anderson, is being pursued for railbanking and preservation by the Indiana Trails Fund. Several opportunities also exist for bike paths, lanes or routes to be added to the quiet country roads between the trail corridors.
Delphi Volunteers Rebuild
Bridge, Clear Future Monon Trail
- October 7, 2004
The Carroll County seat of Delphi, located in north central Indiana, has a long history of volunteer-supported trail projects and the result has been nothing short of extraordinary for a place of its size. With more than 10 marked, multi-use trails, historic bridges, a preserved section of the Wabash & Erie Canal and the new Canal Interpretive Center, the Delphi Historic Trails network represents a substantial investment in the city's livability and is a destination for trail-seekers and history buffs alike.
In July 2003 a devastating flood knocked out one of Delphi's many unique bridges, a suspension bridge over Deer Creek in Riley Park. The bridge is being entirely reconstructed by volunteers.
Volunteers Reconstruct
the Riley Suspension Bridge in Delphi
Also being cleared by volunteers is a section of what is to become a trail along the historic Monon corridor between SR25 and Deer Creek, eventually crossing the "High Bridge" which was a former railroad structure. South of Deer Creek, the new trail is then expected to leave the Monon corridor and make a loop southwestward back to Riley Park. The new "High Bridge Monon Trail" will be about 1 mile long, with another 1-2 miles along Deer Creek.
Volunteers interested in clearing
the Monon corridor or working on the suspension bridge will work October 16th
and assemble in Riley Park at 9 am. Crews should bring gloves, pruners,
hand saws, protective clothing and a desire to see progress. The old right-of-way
of the Monon to work is from Indiana 25 near the old Big R Store out to the
scenic High Bridge over Deer Creek. The worksite entrance will be from CR 300
North just across from Sherry Mears' brick 1850s home less than a mile east
of Highway 25.
Monon Trail and Midland
Trace Plan Approved - September
21, 2004
The extension of the Monon Trail from 146th Street to 216th Street and the Midland Trace from Ditch Road to Gray Road gained approval last week from the Westfield Town Council and Washington Township Parks board. Although only the first 1.5 miles from 146th to 161st Street of the Monon are funded and land acquisition has not begun, the plan to add nearly 15 miles of rail-trail represents an ambitious goal for the town and township. Several supporters at the September 16th public meeting expressed the desire to see the projects proceed as quickly as possible.
The Monon Trail is scheduled to be constructed first, to 161st Street and then on to SR32 in a subsequent phase. The Midland Trace may then see development just west of US31 from the Monon to Quaker Park. Beyond these phases, further development of both trails hinges on US31 upgrade progress. The east-west Midland Trace is slated to cross US31 at the future 169th Street bridge.
The master plan for the Monon included several miles of proposed equestrian trail north of 191st Street, much of it on a separated path from the paved bicycle and pedestrian thoroughfare.
Read more and see a map of Westfield trails.
Read more about the master plan approval from the Noblesville Ledger.
Cardinal Greenway gets Grant
to Connect Richmond and Webster -
September 21, 2004
The Cardinal Greenway's longest undeveloped stretch, from Richmond to southern Delaware County, received a major boost this month as an $800,000 Transportation Enhancement grant was awarded to the project. The northern 7 miles of this undeveloped stretch, from the Mt. Pleasant trailhead to Losantville, received a similar amount in 2003. The 2004 grant will be used in Wayne County to extend the trail about 3 miles from Richmond to Webster, the next town along the former Chesapeake and Ohio rail line. Future phases will begin developing the 12 miles remaining between Webster and Losantville.
The Cardinal Greenway is currently open for 10 miles in Marion, Gas City and Jonesboro - as well as 20 miles in Muncie, Gaston and Mt. Pleasant and a 2-mile trail in Richmond. The three open sections are not connected via trail, but the Muncie and Marion sections have two recommended on-road routes available. Visit the Delaware Greenways site for more information. When completed, the Cardinal Greenway will be over 50 miles in length with contiguous connections to Sweetser and Converse in Grant County, northwest of Marion. The on-road gap between Jonesboro and Gaston will remain indefinitely, leaving out the town of Fairmount. The open sections of trail are currently a portion of the American Discovery Trail route.
Read more from the Richmond Palladium-Item.
Fledgling Nickel Plate Trail
Group nets $850k for 8-mile Trail
- September 8, 2004
The recently incorporated Nickel Plate Trail, Inc., a group of citizens interested in developing the Nickel Plate Trail, has managed to net the largest public grant available to Indiana trails in 2004 - an $850,000 award from the Transportation Enhancement program. Governor Kernan announced the awards yesterday. The NKP group has met since 2000 but attained federal nonprofit status just under two years ago. They won the coveted grant, assisted by trail design firm Green3, on their first try, a remarkable feat which speaks to the importance of this corridor as the backbone trail of north-central Indiana. The city of Peru will act as a pass-through government agent for the funding, though nearly all manpower and coordination will continue to come from NKP, Inc. and its associate the Indiana Trails Fund.
The Nickel Plate rail
bridge over the Wabash River in Peru will be trail-ized with the grant
The grant will go toward construction of an 8-mile paved section of the Nickel Plate Trail from the south side of Peru to the town of Bunker Hill, including trail-ization of the iron truss rail bridge over the Wabash River. NKP president Mike Kuepper was elated over the news, and hinted at more good news to come from a separate pending grant.
The 8 paved miles of the Nickel Plate, when finished, will put it on par with some of the longest and most popular trails in the state - the Monon, Cardinal, Prairie-Duneland and Erie-Lackawanna trails. "Eventually we want to connect it with Converse" said Kuepper, referring to the Miami County town only 11 miles eastward which will be the northwest end of the Cardinal Greenway, Sweetser Switch, and Converse Junction trails. The Nickel Plate trail is situated in the middle of a chain of trails anticipated to bring a leg of the American Discovery Trail almost entirely off-road in Indiana, for a distance of 200 miles, from Richmond to Crown Point.
Transportation Enhancement
Awards for Trail Projects in 2004
- September 7, 2004
The largest public grant available to trail projects nationwide is the coveted Transportation Enhancement award, originating at the federal level and administered in Indiana by INDOT. The TE program is intensely competitive, with approximately an 8:1 ratio of applicants to awards in the bicycle/pedestrian category. Available funds for the program are down by more than 10% from 2003 due to decreased tax revenue. This year's grantees for trail projects:
Nickel
Plate Trail - Peru
Avon Greenways
Pennsy Greenway - Lake County
Salt Creek Trail - Brown County
Jasper Multi-use path
Pumpkinvine Trail - Elkhart
Cardinal Greenway - Wayne County
Calumet River Trail - Gary
White River
Trail - south extension - Indy
Fort Wayne urban trail system
Madison Riverfront Development
Steuben County Trails
Indian Creek Trail System - Harrison County
Monticello Pedestrian Way - Sixth St / W. Shafer Drive
(news release from the Office of
the Governor follows)
Gov. Joe Kernan and Lt. Gov. Kathy
Davis today announced 35 Transportation Enhancement (TE) awards totaling $18.3
million for local community projects in 31 Indiana counties.
"The high quality of life is one thing businesses mention when they decide to locate their companies in our state," Kernan said. "This $18 million investment will bring an added vitality and beauty to our communities by enhancing our streets, greenways and walkways. These projects are good for business and they are good for the state of Indiana."
TE awards are for community projects that are transportation related, but can't be used for actual highway projects, such as resurfacing and new road construction. The grant awards are given in three categories: historic, commerce and bicycle/pedestrian.
Projects range from streetscape improvements and lighting enhancements to landscape beautification and bridge relocation. Of the awards given, eight were for historic projects, 11 for commerce-related projects, 12 for bicycle/pedestrian projects, and four were for projects that fell into multiple categories.
"Often these grant dollars serve as a foundation for broader community development," said Davis, who directs the state's Department of Commerce. "Now, communities across the state have resources to improve their neighborhoods and attract additional investment and interest in their individual projects while also contributing to the state's economic growth."
Grant recipients were notified today by the Indiana Department of Transportation, which administers the program. This year, 141 communities across Indiana applied for the TE funds, which are distributed through the INDOT each fall.
TE funding began with the Intermodal Surface Transportation Efficiency Act of 1991, which provides states with federal funding for a variety of transportation projects.
The TE program operates on an annual cycle, with applications due to INDOT by Jan. 31. The applications are then reviewed by the Transportation Enhancement Selection Committee, which consists of 10 people representing INDOT, Indiana Department of Commerce, Indiana Department of Natural Resources, the Indiana Association of Cities and Towns, the Indiana Association of Counties, the Federal Highway of Administration and a Metropolitan Planning Organization.
Chesterton Plans Trail Connections
- September 2, 2004
Linking downtown and shopping areas, parks, neighborhoods and workplaces with multi-use trails is becoming an area of keen interest among forward-thinking communities. The success of the Monon Trail, both in terms of sheer usage (2 million annual users over 15 miles) and economic development ($13,000 premium on properties located within 1/2 mile of the trail), has opened the eyes of urban planners around Indiana. Using trails like the Monon, Fort Wayne's Rivergreenway or northwest Indiana's Prairie-Duneland Trail as a backbone, trail networks are being drawn to bring trail users from their doorsteps to the trails, and to a number of tangent destinations.
The northwest Indiana town of Chesterton is capitalizing on the success of the long-established Prairie-Duneland Trail, a 10-mile backbone connecting Chesterton on the east end to Hobart on the west end, to make a new connection from this backbone to its downtown area and to the new urbanist Coffee Creek Center. The town will receive a $133,000 federal grant from the Indiana DNR to begin the first phase of the approximately 2.5-mile project, dubbed the Westchester-Liberty Trail.
Read the full article in the Northwest IN Times here.
State Agencies Help Save
Rail and Trail - August 19,
2004
While Indiana government agencies today may be more verbal in their support of railroads and trails than they were 10 years ago, taking action to preserve them has still been an exceedingly rare occasion. This July one such action came in support for preserving 33 miles of abandoning rail corridor in northwest Indiana, saving the corridor for local transportation and carving out a new potential off-road route in Indiana for the cross-country American Discovery Trail (ADT) , which is anticipated to be developed parallel to the active rail line. This new rail-trail would represent one of the first rail-trails facilitated by state agencies, beyond providing grants.
The Indiana Department of Transportation (INDOT) and Department of Natural Resources (DNR) together with the town of North Judson in Starke County purchased 33 miles of former Pere Marquette and Chesapeake and Ohio RR track from CSX in Starke, Porter, and LaPorte Counties. Preserving this corridor insures economic development in the area and access to the Hoosier Valley Railroad Museum in North Judson.
This unprecedented historic action was the result of exceptional cooperation of many people, both local and state - and was made under a severely constrained time schedule imposed by the Federal Surface Transportation Board. Saving this line will not only enable a future 14-mile American Discovery trail segment to connect from North Judson northwest to Malden and toward Chicago (shown as a bold blue line segment on the map below), but will also preserve railbanking on16 miles of (former Erie Lackawanna RR) corridor running southeast of North Judson to Monterey and toward Rochester, the north end of the developing Nickel Plate Trail. The Indiana Trails Fund and the Hoosier Valley RR Museum are cooperating toward saving this 16 miles.
Long-distance trail projects in Indiana
In all, nearly 200 miles off-road trail are now possible along the northern route of the American Discovery Trail in Indiana. Three major gaps in planned trails still exist - Rochester to Monterey (about 15 miles), Bunker Hill to Converse (11 miles) and Jonesboro to Gaston, where an established on-road route already exists, courtesy of the Cardinal Greenway organization. Most of the current route of the ADT in nearby states is on-road.
Fort Wayne Area Establishes New Trail Group - August 19, 2004
Joining the regional Greenway Consortium and west-side Aboite New Trails, Inc., a new trails advocacy group has formed to support trail development on the north side of Fort Wayne. Northwest Allen Trails Trails, Inc. has announced their first community meeting in a press release below. Sparked by strong leadership from the Greenway Consortium, which began as a group to support the Rivergreenway, the Fort Wayne area has seen tremendous interest in expanding their regional trail network, the backbone of which has been the 19-mile Rivergreenway. Read more about Northwest Allen Trails' projects in this August 26 article by the News-Sentinel.
Northwest Allen Trails Announces Community Meeting
Information on trail development group and results of survey to be sharedFort Wayne, Ind. - Northwest Allen Trails, Inc., a not-for-profit corporation, is announcing an informational community meeting to be held at 7:00 p.m. Thursday, August 26 in the Hickory Creek Center cafeteria, 3606 Baird Road on the south side of the Carroll High School campus.
The group was founded with the goal of evaluating northwest Fort Wayne and Allen County for potential multi-use trail development. Multi-use trails are typically 8 to 12 feet wide paved paths that allow various non-motorized activities, including walking, jogging, bicycling, in-line skating, and cross country skiing.
"We are excited to present what has the potential to be a strong community asset," said Mike Kelly, spokesperson for Northwest Allen Trails. "The benefits include the overall health, connectedness and well-being of the community, environmental preservation, and as a contribution to our area's economic development efforts."
The proposed paths would connect urban, suburban and rural areas, and would be similar to the existing Greenway system in the heart of the city. The group has been working with the Fort Wayne Parks Department and Greenway Consortium on the long term goal of connecting their efforts with the existing and planned network of trails.
There are two north-south railroad beds in the area that are of particular interest to the group. One rail bed is centered between State Road 3/Lima Road and Coldwater road, passing along the east side of the Salomon Farm Park and Parkview YMCA. The other rail bed is west of State Road 3/Lima road and runs along the west side of Huntertown.
"We view these rail beds as potential arteries for a network of trails on northwest side of the city and county," said Mr. Kelly. "They have the potential to connect many neighborhoods, with surrounding schools, parks, churches, libraries and businesses."
The rail beds are 66 to 100 feet wide, with fully grown trees lining the majority of their length. The trees would be preserved, offering a linear park-like feel along the trail, and privacy to adjacent properties.
The group will also present the results of a 300 piece mailing that was sent to owners of homes and properties on and along each of the rail beds. The mailing included an informational postcard and survey asking for their level of support for and thoughts on potential trails.
"We wanted be respectful and contact those property owners first," said Mr. Kelly. "They would be most affected by any trail, and we wanted to gather their thoughts. There are many communities that have implemented similar rail trails, and we are trying to borrow their best ideas to address many of the issues we have heard."
The group will also be signing up additional volunteers for membership, safety, marketing, fund raising, and construction/maintenance committee work. "There will be plenty of opportunities for people of all ages to help," said Mr. Kelly. "This is truly a community project." More information on Northwest Allen Trails can be found at www.northwestallentrails.org.
###
Mike Kelly,
Northwest Allen Trails, Inc.
(260) 450-7167; fax (260) 426-3838; or e-mail mirkelly@netzero.net
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