For the past week, we’ve been looking at the current explosive growth of the Raleigh greenway system: $35 million to add about 45 miles of greenway. By 2014, Raleigh should have about 116 miles of greenway, with new, vital links along the Neuse River, Crabtree Creek, Walnut Creek, House Creek and Honeycutt Creek.

The current construction will basically fulfill the city’s 1976 goal of establishing a greenway network, a secondary, pedestrian transportation system making it possible to get around much of Raleigh with minimal exposure to motorized traffic.

While Raleigh is well on its way toward a greenway network worthy of national envy, what about the rest of the Triangle? How are we coming along to fulfill the Circle the Triangle concept first promoted by the Triangle Greenways Council in the 1990s?

There’s promising news on two fronts.

After innumerable delays, a bridge over I-40 in Durham linking 7.7 miles of the American Tobacco Trail north into downtown Durham with trail on the south side of I-40 extending into Chatham and western Wake County appears ready to become reality. In late February, a $7.5 million contract for the bridge and about 4 miles of connecting trail was received and subsequently approved by both Durham and the N.C. Department of Transportation. Construction is scheduled to begin in about a month, the project is expected to be completed in June 2013.

It’s been an exhaustive wait. The 22-mile American Tobacco Trail was conceived in the 1980s, the first stretch of trail opened in the 1990s and its completion has been eagerly anticipated since.

“All I can say is there are so many people asking about this, anticipating its completion that it’s great that it’s finally happening,” Dale McKeel, Durham’s Bicycle and Pedestrian Coordinator said Wednesday.

The American Tobacco Trail is considered the spine of the Circle the Triangle goal: It was envisioned that trails in adjoining municipalities would link into the ATT, making it possible to ride a bike from any municipality in the Triangle to any other. The most coveted connection: From downtown Durham to downtown Raleigh. That leads us to the good news on the second front.

In January, the Wake County Commissioners directed that greenways be added to projects considered for funding through a $50 million open space bond approved by voters in 2007. Previously, the money had been targeted to “lands such as forests, meadows, floodplains and stream corridors,” according to the Wake County Web site. “The top priority is to protect and improve water quality by safeguarding lakes, rivers and streams.”

About half of the $50 million remains, $5 million of which is immediately available, according to Sig Hutchinson, who chairs the county’s Open Space and Parks Advisory Committee. Money would be available in matching funds, meaning the municipality would have to put up as much as the county. And there is a cap on the county’s total outlay per project of $500,000 to $750,000.

Greenway fans couldn’t have a better advocate for making sure the commissioners’ mandate is carried out. Hutchinson was a major backer of the Circle the Triangle concept when he served as president of the Triangle Greenway Council and has been instrumental in pushing greenway development throughout the Triangle. He knows how — and where — the money can best be spent.

“I haven’t been so excited about finding real money in a long time,” Hutchinson said Wednesday.

Here are some areas where Hutchinson thinks the money can be most effective.

Cary: White Oak Creek Greenway connection to the American Tobacco Trail. Currently, Cary’s White Oak Creek Greenway stops a couple miles shy of the ATT. It’s a crucial couple of miles because it would make that vital link between downtown Durham and Raleigh. Here’s the problem: the remaining two miles is actually in Apex, and Apex is more interested in completing it’s Beaver Creek Greenway, which will connect downtown Apex with the American Tobacco Trail.

“We’ve jokingly talked about annexing Apex,” says Hutchinson.

And Cary has been above offering its expertise outside its jurisdiction to get a trail done. The 4.5-mile stretch of the ATT in Chatham County was in limbo until Cary stepped in and had its planners address key design issues.

Knightdale: As part of the developing Neuse River Trail, a $630,000 suspension bridge (the longest pedestrian suspension bridge in the state, according to Hutchinson) will be built over Mingo Creek. The goal is to build three miles of greenway connecting the Neuse River Trail to Knightdale. “The [open space] money wouldn’t get the greenway all the way to Knightdale, but it’s a good start,” Hutchinson.

Wake Forest: Already under construction where Smith Creek dumps into the Neuse River is what Hutchinson says will be the longest pedestrian bridge in the state. The goal: link the Neuse River Trail with the town of Wake Forest. Again, says Hutchinson, the county contribution wouldn’t be quite enough to make the entire connection, but it’s close.

Hutchinson says Holly Springs and Morrisville have also expressed interest in applying for open space matching funds.

This much appears nearly certain for the Triangle’s greenway system:

• In about a month, Raleigh’s House Creek Greenway will link the 12-mile Crabtree Creek Trail with the Reedy Creek and Rocky Branch greenways, a total distance of about 9 miles (with connections to the south with the Walnut Creek Trail and to the north with Umstead State Park and Cary’s Black Creek Greenway).
• By summer 2013, the 22-mile American Tobacco Trail will be completed, linking downtown Durham with western Wake County.
• By summer 2013, Raleigh’s 28-mile Neuse River Trail will be done, running from Falls Lake dam south to the Wake County line, where it will meet with five more miles in Johnston County, into Clayton.
• By fall 2013, Raleigh’s Walnut Creek Greenway will be complete from the Farmer’s Market off Lake Wheeler Road east to the Neuse River Trail, a distance of about 12 miles. (From there, it will join with a little under three miles of greenway planned through N.C. State’s Centennial Campus, then connected with existing greenway linking with and running around Lake Johnson.)
• By early 2014, Raleigh’s Walnut Creek Greenway will be done from near Ebenezer Church Road downstream to the Neuse River Trail, a distance of 16.7 miles.

The Triangle may not be circled with greenway, but within two years much of it will be connected.

* * *

A week(plus) of greenways

Our week(plus) of greenways:

Thursday, April 12: House Creek Greenway to Open June 25 (Read: Memorial Day)
Monday: 90 Second Escape: Raleigh’s Growing Greenway System
Tuesday: Raleigh’s Neuse River Trail: Another 3.5 miles by August, 16.1 miles by November.
Wednesday: Raleigh’s Greenway: 2014 and Beyond.
Today: The big picture: A look at how the Triangle’s greenway network will look in less than two years.

* * *
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The long-awaited pedestrian bridge over I-40 in Durham that represents the last link in the 22-mile American Tobacco Trail — the link that was supposed to begin construction later this summer and open next year — has been derailed.

Turns out the project will cost about $2 million more than Durham anticipated, $2 million that the city must now try to come up with in a period of extreme cutbacks in across-the-board government spending.

Durham had allotted $5.8 million for the project, which includes the bridge and 4.2 miles of trail, from N.C 54 south to the Chatham County line. But when bids from eight contractors were opened on July 15, the lowest, from Blythe Construction, was $7.75 million.

Asked about the discrepancy – why Durham’s estimate was so far off the mark — project manager Byron Brady said the bid package, which was advertised beginning in April, was put together by a consultant. Yet even as far back as 2007, Durham acknowledged the project could cost as much as $6.3 million.

As for what funding options the city might have, Brady said, “I’m not at liberty to say.”

Dale McKeel, Durham’s Bicycle and Pedestrian Coordinator, was likewise mum: “We are looking at several options. There are no dead ends at this point.”

One place they won’t be getting additional money is from the N.C. Department of Transportation, which is already into the project – known as Phase E of the American Tobacco Trail – for $4.7 million.

“Unfortunately, we don’t have any money to add to the project,” said Kumar Trivedi, interim director of NCDOT’s Division of Bicycle and Pedestrian Transportation. “We have some money, but it’s already being spent on existing projects.”

Trivedi said he suggested that Durham look into TIGER grants — transportation-specific money available through the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act — and check with DOT’s local programs branch for TIP enhancement projects.

One possibility Durham will consider is what it might be able to do with the $5.8 million it does have. Brady and McKeel would only say that’s a possibility; Dave Connelly with the Triangle Rails-to-Trails Conservancy had a couple of thoughts on the matter.

“We discussed this very question Monday night at the TRTC meeting,” said Connelly, a longtime member of the non-profit. “Since the southern half of this project (the abandoned rail bed) is already good enough to use, it would seem logical to focus new construction work at the north end (NC 54/I-40) and proceed south until the money runs out.

“But,” he’s quick to add, “all the permissions were painstakingly obtained for the complete 4-mile project, and making any changes would likely require new signatures, an agonizing process.”

Determined not to be deterred, Connelly has suggested a funding alternative to Durham, an alternative that may not be as far-fetched as it seems in these days of political parsimony.

“I wonder if the City could set up a charitable fund and allow donations to ‘bridge the gap’ in this project funding.  Since 3,038 people have signed a 2006 online petition

, at least some of them could put their money where their mouth is.”

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