by Thomas Breen
City Plan Director Brown: This is an example of putting Vision 2034 to work. Credit: Thomas Breen photo
The Elicker administration unveiled plans on Thursday for a new and expanded crosstown bike route that would stretch from Westville to Fair Haven — as part of a five-year plan to build out, and connect, five city “greenways.”
Mayor Justin Elicker, City Engineer Giovanni Zinn, City Plan Director Laura Brown, and a dozen other city officials, state legislators, and local parks advocates made that announcement during a press conference held at the Barnard Nature Center at West River Memorial Park at 200 Derby Ave.
The focus of the presser was the city’s new “Greenways 2030” initiative, which Elicker described as a five-year effort to fill out a citywide network of bike lanes and walking routes protected from car traffic and to build on the city’s Safe Routes for All plan from 2022.
The mayor highlighted five such “greenways,” four of which already exist in various states of completion: the Farmington Canal Heritage Trail, the Mill River Greenway Trail, the Shoreline Greenway Trail, and the West River Greenway Trail.
The newly announced fifth such route — dubbed a “Crosstown Greenway Trail” — would build off of the existing Edgewood cycletrack that runs from Forest Road to Park Street. It would then cut through downtown, potentially along Elm Street, and then through Wooster Square and across Fair Haven, potentially along Exchange Street.
Zinn and Brown stressed that the exact route for this new “Crosstown Greenway” is very much in flux. So is what the actual protected-from-the-roadway infrastructure might actually look like. Thursday’s announcement marked the kickoff for what will be several months of planning efforts.
The city wants to hear from the public — including at public meetings at the Barnard Nature Center on Nov. 13 at 6 p.m., and at the Salperto building in East Shore Park on Nov. 20 at 6 p.m.
See more here for a website the city’s up about this Greenways 2030 initiative.
Brown said that this initiative is directly in line with the city’s newly adopted Vision 2034 comprehensive plan. This demonstrates “how we can move from plan to action,” she said. These “greenways” are not just transportation routes, she said, but also “places where we meet our neighbors.”
Brown described two key predecessors to this 2030 effort: a 2004 citywide greenways plan, as well as a 1910 city plan put together by Cass Gilbert and Frederick Law Olmsted, Jr. which called for greatly expanding the city’s public greenspaces.
Elicker and Zinn said that these five greenways have already benefited from or are slated to receive a combined total of $37 million in recent local, state, and federal funds — including, as New Haven State Sen. and President Pro Tem Martin Looney said, $14 million in state funds for the Mill River Trail, the Farmington Canal, and the Shoreline Trail.
“We want to have a lot of public input,” Zinn said, about how these current and new greenways should ultimately be built out. In regards to the proposed new crosstown route, he said, “we’re trying to thread the needle and get a route across the city,” including where this greenway goes downtown.
West River Watershed Coalition lead organizer Stephanie FitzGerald …
… and Mill River Trail champ JR Logan, on the speaking lineup at Thursday’s presser.
City Engineer Zinn: We want public input.